Platt's Commodity News examines Buccaneer Energy's intensive exploration drilling in Cook Inlet, Alaska. The company plans three exploration wells later this spring to delineate its Kenai Loop gas discovery on the Kenai Peninsula.

Drilling will begin when a 3-D seismic survey at the field is completed, company CEO James Watt told the Resources Committee of the state Senate.

Buccaneer now has one well producing 5,000 Mcf/day of gas in the field and plans to increase its production to 15,000 Mcf/day day later this year, Watt said.   Buccaneer also plans more drilling, including two wells at an offshore prospect in Cook Inlet with a jack-up rig due to arrive in June, a third offshore well at a third offshore prospect later in the year, and another onshore prospect in the southern Kenai Peninsula area, Watt told the legislators....Watt said Buccaneer will be using the Endeavour jack-up rig that is owned jointly with Singapore-based Ezion Holdings, and that will be brought to Cook Inlet from Singapore in June.

Buccaneer is also close to closing a deal to acquire leases in the Cosmopolitan oil prospect in the Inlet from Pioneer Natural Resources.

Garrett Nenner, Managing Director at Momentum Trading Partners, speaks with Phil Albinus about how regulators, including the SEC and the CFTC, are struggling to keep up with -- and keep a grip on -- the warp-speed world of high-frequency trading. Fearing that the markets are dangerously out of control, regulators are considering some severe measures to slow down high-speed traders. Read More >>>