Watershed at a Glance. The Cannon River watershed is located south of the Twin Cities and encompasses areas of Dakota, Goodhue, Le Sueur, Steele, Rice and Waseca counties. The watershed drains approximately 1,460 square miles through two main channels, the Cannon and Straight Rivers, to the Mississippi at Red Wing.
While some large industrial, commercial, and electric generation customers receive natural gas directly from high capacity interstate and intrastate pipelines (usually contracted through natural gas marketing companies), most other users receive natural gas from their local gas utility, also called a local distribution company (LDC).
How Natural Gas Works. Natural gas is a versatile fossil fuel that we use for heating, cooking, electricity production, transportation, and as an industrial feedstock. In 2012, it made up 30 percent of the U.S. energy mix, and it continues to be a readily available domestic resource as a result of recent discoveries and advances in extraction technology. [1]