FERC has asked Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. LLC to provide additional information on its Orion Project before it completes an environmental assessment (EA).

TGP filed paperwork for the project with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission last October (see Daily GPI, Oct. 9, 2015). Orion is a 13-mile looping project on TGP’s 300 Line designed to serve growing demand in the Middle Atlantic and New England regions, with additional service from Susquehanna County to Pike County, in Pennsylvania [CP16-4].

On Wednesday, FERC’s Office of Special Projects asked TGP to provide, among other things, additional information on how Orion would impact vegetation and wildlife, cultural resources and land use.

FERC asked the company to clarify how in-stream work windows were established for exceptional value and naturally reproducing wild trout streams, class A wild trout streams, trout stocked fisheries and approved trout waters, all of which were contained in a supplemental filing TGP submitted last February.

Federal regulators also asked TGP to explain a discrepancy involving a proposed pipe yard. FERC said the supplemental filing indicated the pipe yard would consist of 13.97 undeveloped acres and 1.4 acres of forest vegetation. But according to filings with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and Pennsylvania’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, the Fish and Boat Commission and the Game Commission (PAGC), TGP said the pipe yard would be 15.36 acres and is a disturbed sand/gravel mining site, with no reference to forested areas.

FERC also asked TGP to provide copies of correspondence to PAGC and FWS on a few other issues, including impacts to state game lands, a summer bat survey report and a conservation plan designed to protect the Indiana Bat.

According to TGP parent Kinder Morgan Inc., customers that have signed up for all of the 135,000 Dth/d of incremental capacity on the Orion Project are South Jersey Resources Group LLC, South Jersey Gas Co., and Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. (see Daily GPI, Nov. 16, 2015).

Orion is composed of three components: constructing a 36-inch diameter, 8.23-mile pipeline loop along the 300 Line in Wayne and Pike counties, PA (Loop 322); constructing a 36-inch diameter, 4.68-mile loop along the 300 Line in Pike County (Loop 323); and installing appurtenant and auxiliary facilities.

Construction is expected to begin next January, with an in-service date in June 2018. The projected project cost is $143 million.