Alliance Pipeline will shut down its system from 8 a.m. CST next Wednesday (Oct. 12) until 8 a.m. CST Oct. 19, cutting an estimated 1.9 Bcf/d of gas, to facilitate pipe removal and tie-ins of new pipe at a crossing of a major highway project near Regina, Saskatchewan.

The work will be done at each of the two sites where the mainline will be crossed by the Saskatchewan Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure’s Regina Bypass Project, the Calgary-based company said.

“To accommodate the highway work (to be completed in 2019), and meet future regulatory requirements, Alliance will install a new segment of heavier wall pipe in each of those locations,” Alliance said Wednesday. “This requires us to shut down our pipeline for several days to install the new pipe and connect it to the existing system…To do this work, Alliance must close valves on either side of the construction area and remove the natural gas from the isolated section of pipe.”

The work would cut about 1.9 Bcf/d of raw gas flows, analysts at data and analytics company Genscape Inc. said Wednesday.

“Flows across the U.S./Canada border have averaged 1.7 Bcf/d over the previous two weeks, and the Tioga and Bantry receipt points in North Dakota have a combined average of 0.2 Bcf/d,” Genscape said. Alliance delivers most of the gas to Vector (0.7 Bcf/d 14-day average), ANR (0.6 Bcf/d 14-day average) and Nicor (0.14 Bcf/d 14-day average), the analysts said.

The National Energy Board directed Alliance to flare the natural gas as it is cleared from the pipe. Alliance anticipates that the flaring operation would last two days (Oct. 12 and 13), probably from morning until mid-evening each day. Smaller-scale flaring may also occur overnight on a contingency basis, Alliance said.

The Alliance system consists of a 3,848-kilometer (2,391-mile) integrated Canadian and U.S. natural gas transmission pipeline system, delivering rich natural gas from the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin and the Williston Basin to the Chicago market hub.

The Regina Bypass, designed to improve safety issues on Trans-Canada Highway 1 East, is the largest publicly owned transportation infrastructure project undertaken in the province’s history, according to the Government of Saskatchewan.