As producers’ interest in the Permian Basin’s Cline Shale oil play continues to grow, Occidental Petroleum Corp. unit Centurion Pipeline LP is reactivating and expanding an existing pipeline system overlying the Cline, the company said.

The Cline Shale Pipeline System will be capable of transporting crude oil from Irion, Tom Green, Sterling, Coke and Mitchell counties in West Texas to Centurion’s terminal in Colorado City, TX. From there, shippers will have the option to transport crude to Cushing, OK, via the Centurion Pipeline and to Gulf Coast refiners via the BridgeTex Pipeline, which is expected to be in service in July 2014, Centurion said. The 400-mile, 20-inch diameter BridgeTex originates in Colorado City and ends in Texas City and will have the capacity to transport up to 300,000 b/d.

Producers active in the Cline Shale, which underlies the Wolfcamp Shale, include Devon Energy Corp. and Apache Corp.

The Permian has been a Devon legacy asset and offers exploration and development opportunities from geologic reservoirs and plays, including the oil-rich Wolfberry, Bone Spring, Wolfcamp Shale, Delaware, Cline Shale and various conventional formations, according to the company.

Apache has an estimated 650,000 gross acres (520,000 net) prospective for Cline Shale development with an estimated 642 million boe of resource potential from 2,300 identified drilling locations, according to the company, which claims one of the largest Cline Shale petrophysical databases in the industry. During the fourth quarter, Apache completed an additional two wells in the lower Cline horizontal program in the Deadwood area. To date, eight Apache-operated wells have been completed and are currently producing at a combined rate of 1,050 b/d and 1.4 MMcf/d.

With initial capacity to transport up to 75,000 b/d of crude, the Cline Shale Pipeline System could be expanded as production grows, Centurion said. The system will originate about 80 miles south of Colorado City and will include truck unloading facilities at Centurion’s Texas Sterling City and Arden stations and at other locations as warranted by production, the company said. The pipeline is expected to be brought into service in multiple phases starting in the second quarter and is expected to be completed by the first quarter of 2014.

Those interested in capacity on the system can contact Rick Van Eyk at (713) 215-7905, or rick_vaneyk@oxy.com.

Centurion is an oil gathering, common carrier pipeline and storage system with about 2,700 miles of pipelines from southeast New Mexico across the Permian Basin of West Texas to Cushing. The system has 85 truck unloading facilities along the pipeline and 5.8 million bbl of active storage capability.

Last April Centurion said it would develop two new pipelines to serve the Delaware and Permian basins in West Texas and eastern New Mexico. They will gather crude from the Wolfbone, Bone Spring and Wolfcamp fields near Pecos, TX, and deliver it to Crane, Ector and Midland, TX, for transportation to markets.

The proposed 12-inch diameter Delaware Basin-to-Crane pipeline is to have an initial capacity to transport 75,000 b/d of crude from gathering lines in producing fields throughout the Delaware Basin. It is to run about 75 miles east to Centurion’s station at Crane and is expected to be in service during the second quarter.

A second project is to have capacity to transport up to 50,000 b/d of crude and will connect Centurion’s Crane, Ector and Midland stations.