FERC has issued a favorable environmental assessment (EA) of Magnum Gas Storage LLC’s Utah project that will provide storage capacity to markets throughout the western United States via the Kern River Gas Transmission and Questar Pipeline systems.

“Approval of the proposed project, with appropriate mitigating measures, would not constitute a major federal action significantly affecting the quality of the human environment,” the staff of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and cooperating agencies said of the Magnum Gas Storage Project and associated pipeline header facility [CP10-22].

The project calls for the construction of four caverns with a total working gas capacity of 42 Bcf. Magnum said an open season demonstrated that there is “substantial market demand” for the services that the project would offer. It also proposes to construct a 61.6-mile, bidirectional, 36-inch diameter transmission line in Millard, Juab and Utah counties, which would have the capacity to transport up to 1.2 Bcf/d and would connect with pipelines near Goshen, UT.

Directly interconnecting to both the Kern River and Questar pipeline systems at Goshen would give Magnum customers direct access to more pipeline capacity in the aggregate and access to a broader market areas than would be available through a connection to a single pipeline, according to the EA.

“Magnum has stated that the project would provide greater system reliability and increased operating flexibility to the growing and increasingly volatile western U.S. natural gas market,” FERC said in the EA.

“The project would enhance the ability of the interstate gas transmission infrastructure to handle fluctuations in hourly demand for natural gas imposed by gas-fired electric generating facilities, which are increasingly being used to back up and ‘firm’ intermittent wind and other renewable generation sources,” Magnum Gas Storage told FERC.

©Copyright 2010Intelligence Press Inc. All rights reserved. The preceding news reportmay not be republished or redistributed, in whole or in part, in anyform, without prior written consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.