Williams Partners LP has signed up two shippers for Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co.’s (Transco) Gulf Connector project, which would enable bi-directional flow on a portion of Transco between Louisiana and South Texas. The capacity would serve two liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals.

The 475,000 Dth/d Gulf Connector would deliver gas for the Cheniere Energy Inc. Corpus Christi liquefaction project and a shipper in Freeport LNG Development LP’s liquefaction project near Freeport, TX. Both the Corpus Christi and Freeport liquefaction facilities are under construction.

The project involves adding compression and is designed to provide incremental firm transportation from Transco’s Station 65 in St. Helena Parish, LA, to mainline interconnects with proposed header pipelines in Wharton and San Patricio counties in Texas.

As previously announced, Williams Partners is also building the Gulf Trace Project to serve Cheniere’s Sabine Pass Liquefaction project in Cameron Parish, LA (see Daily GPI, Oct. 23, 2015). The first shipment of LNG from that facility is expected late February or March (see Daily GPI, Jan. 14). The Gulf Trace Project is expected to be completed in early 2017. Both Gulf Connector and Gulf Trace are included in Williams Partners’ 2016 growth capital funding plan.

Cheniere’s Corpus Christi export terminal is proposed to have up to five liquefaction trains (two of which are under construction) with expected aggregate nominal production capacity of up to 22.5 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) of LNG. Train 1 and 2 are expected to become operational in late 2018 and mid-2019, respectively.

The Freeport LNG terminal will have three liquefaction trains with expected aggregate export capacity of 15.3 mtpa. The Freeport export facility is also planned to commence operations in phases between September 2018 and August 2019.