A unit of Williams announced last Monday an agreement to discontinue the development of the troubled Georgia Strait Crossing pipeline project to serve power generators on Vancouver Island in Canada.

Williams Gas Pipeline and British Columbia Hydro and Power Authority, co-sponsors of the project, mutually agreed to end plans to build the $209 million natural gas pipeline across the Strait of Georgia to Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The proposed pipeline was to serve BC Hydro’s proposed gas-fired 265 MW Vancouver Island Generation Project, which British Columbia regulators rejected in the fall of 2003 as being too costly.

Project development costs, estimated at approximately $34 million, were funded by BC Hydro. Under the terms of the agreement with Williams, BC Hydro will assume full responsibility for all project costs, Williams said.

The decision on whether the pipeline project would proceed has been on hold since September 2003, pending a regulatory review of energy needs on Vancouver Island. The 84-mile pipeline received a FERC certificate in September 2002 and similar approval from the National Energy Board of Canada in December 2003.

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