Enterprise Products Operating LLC and Tenaska Marketing Ventures’ on Thursday received from FERC a temporary waiver of the Commission’s capacity release regulations and related Northern Border Pipeline Co. tariff provisions.

Last month the two companies filed a petition with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission requesting all necessary approvals and waivers to facilitate Enterprises’ sale to Tenaska of several transportation agreements and a related natural gas purchase agreement as part of an integrated transaction to allow Enterprise’s exit from the natural gas marketing business in the Midwest [RP18-183].

Enterprise and Tenaska asked specifically for temporary waivers of FERCs capacity release posting and bidding regulations, shipper-must-have-title policy, prohibitions against buy/sell arrangements and against tying arrangements in capacity releases, and the capacity release-related FERC gas tariff provisions of Northern Border Pipeline Co. that implement those policies.

Under a joint venture (JV) project the companies had planned but which never materialized, gas originating at Enterprise’s processing plant in the Piceance Basin in northwest Colorado would have been transported through the Powder River Basin to an interconnection with the pipeline, allowing access to Chicago-area markets. But with the JV set aside, “Enterprise now seeks an orderly and efficient exit from the capacity and associated gas purchase obligations that are not related to its existing or planned midstream operations,” according to the filing.

Under terms of a purchase and sale agreement still being finalized, Tenaska would acquire all of the assets Enterprise acquired in connection with the unconsumated JV project. Closing of the transaction is expected to be on Jan. 1, they said in their filing.

FERC approved the request, limiting the waivers “to the extent necessary to effectuate the transaction…and to complete the permanent releases of capacity specified in the petition.” The waivers will remain in effect for 90 days, FERC said.