FERC staff has issued a draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) for Texas LNG Brownsville LLC’s proposal for a liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal at the Port of Brownsville in South Texas.

The project would result in adverse environmental impacts, but with a single exception those impacts would be reduced to less than significant levels with the implementation of Texas LNG’s proposed impact avoidance, minimization and mitigation measures and additional measures recommended by Staff, according to the DEIS [CP16-116]. Impacts on visual resources would be significant when viewed from the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, staff said.

Texas LNG filed at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in March 2016 for authorization to site, construct and operate a 4 million metric ton/year (mmty) export terminal proposed on a 625-acre site on the Brownsville Ship Channel in Cameron County, TX.

The terminal would be fed via a yet-to-be-constructed intrastate pipeline accessing gas supplies from the Agua Dulce hub near Corpus Christi and about 150 miles to the north of Brownsville.

The pipeline would potentially serve other LNG export terminals as well as industrial and power generation facilities and export markets in Mexico, Texas LNG told the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

The Agua Dulce hub interconnects with interstate and intrastate pipelines such as Texas Eastern Transmission, Tennessee Gas Pipeline, facilities of Energy Transfer Partners and Enterprise Products Partners, Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America and Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line.

Last month, FERC issued environmental schedules for a dozen pending LNG terminal projects, including Texas LNG. FERC also signed a memorandum of understanding with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to coordinate the siting and safety review of FERC-jurisdictional LNG facilities.

FERC will accept comment on the DEIS through Dec. 17.