Sep. 21, 2009 (PR Newswire) --

CHICAGO, Sept. 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Integrys Energy Group, Inc. (NYSE: TEG) today announced that Integrys Energy Services of Canada Corp., a subsidiary of its nonregulated subsidiary, Integrys Energy Services, Inc., has closed its transaction to sell nearly all of its Canadian natural gas and electric power contract portfolio to Shell Energy North America (Canada) Inc., a subsidiary of Shell Energy North America (US). Effective October 1, 2009, these customer contracts will be integrated into Shell Energy's existing natural gas and power portfolio.

In a separate transaction, Integrys Energy Services of Canada Corp. has completed the sale of its 2-bcf natural gas storage contract to TransCanada Gas Storage Partnership, a subsidiary of TransCanada Corporation, one of the largest natural gas storage providers in North America with approximately 370 bcf of storage capacity.

With these two transactions, Integrys Energy Services, Inc. has exited electric and natural gas marketing in all provinces in Canada, leaving only the New Brunswick-based power generation and associated electricity production. As a result of the closing of these two transactions, Integrys Energy Group's collateral support requirements, which include corporate guarantees, letters of credit and cash, are expected to be reduced by approximately $300 million by year-end 2009.

"These transactions demonstrate our commitment to reducing the collateral requirements and capital investment for Integrys Energy Services," said Integrys Energy Group President and Chief Executive Officer Charles A. Schrock. "These deals, part of our structured capital redeployment process, will strengthen our balance sheet to support the growth of our core regulated utilities business."

J.P. Morgan Securities acted as exclusive financial advisor to Integrys Energy Group and Thorndike Landing acted as lead advisor to Integrys Energy Services for these transactions.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. You can identify these statements by the fact that they do not relate strictly to historical or current facts and often include words such as "anticipate," "expect," "intend," and other similar words. Forward-looking statements are beyond the ability of Integrys Energy Group to control and, in many cases, Integrys Energy Group cannot predict what factors would cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated by forward-looking statements.