The Millennium Pipeline project last week joined a crowd ofother proposed pipelines and expansions that are being delayed formarket or regulatory reasons. The announcement makes it even morelikely the widespread market impacts expected from increases inpipeline links between western Canada and the midwestern andnortheastern U.S. probably won’t be felt until winter 2000-2001.

Millennium officials said its shippers requested service bedelayed until November 2000 to give the market and the upstreamsupply community time to prepare for greater transportationcapacity and to give the project more time to crawl through theregulatory process.

Millennium informed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ofthe revised project schedule, which calls for some portions of the442-mile pipeline roughly between Lake Erie and New York City to beconstructed in 1999 with the balance built the following year.

It joins the Independence Pipeline and MarketLink projects,Millennium competitors, and the Alliance Pipeline. Another majorproject, Viking Voyageur, dropped out of the picture in April.Millennium’s reasons for the delay appear to be similar to those ofIndependence and MarketLink. The shippers on those projects areprimarily large marketing firms.

A spokesman indicated Millennium’s nine shippers, who are mainlypipeline affiliated marketers (Engage, TransCanada and Columbia arethe largest capacity holders) requested the delay in part to givethe market more time to develop and to give upstream supplyproviders more time to prepare. Millennium plans to file revisedshipper agreements soon with FERC.

“Our shippers have indicated that a Nov. 1, 2000 in-service datewill meet their objectives to provide economically priced suppliesof natural gas to customers in the East,” said Millennium ProjectManager David Pentzien. “The schedule also provides flexibility forMillennium to schedule construction activities during optimalperiods from summer 1999 through fall of 2000.”

The pipeline company, a partnership of Columbia Gas, TransCanadaPipeLines, MCN Energy and Westcoast Energy, originally requested apreliminary determination on non-environmental grounds (PD) on theproject from FERC by May. But a spokesman said FERC’s delay on thePD played no role in this decision. The pipeline company now isrequesting a PD by September with final FERC approval by April 30,1999.

The $650 million pipeline project is designed to transport 700MMcf/d of gas from a connection with TransCanada PipeLines in themiddle of Lake Erie to a connection with Consolidated Edison inWestchester County, NY. Nearly 90% of its route is to be built inexisting rights of way.

Rocco Canonica

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