Portland Natural Gas Transmission System has become the secondmajor import pipeline project being delayed well into the winterfrom expected Nov. 1 start up. The pipeline said the 152 MMcf/d ofCanadian gas scheduled to flow to New England markets this fallprobably will not enter the pipe until sometime in January at theearliest.

Northern Border said last month it expects service delays untilat least the end of the year because of heavy rains along itsconstruction route. PNGTS officials also blamed summer flooding forhindered construction plans.

“We had one major problem this year,” said PNGTS spokesmanRichard Anderson. “As of today we’re about 18 inches higher intotal rainfall than the average. That’s like 30% more rain thisyear. The vast majority of that rain fell in a couple weeks in Junewhen we were trying to get started and then we had 10-11 inches ofrain a couple weeks ago in a two-and-a-half-day period which causedus to spend a lot of time preparing erosion control structures. Wehad originally estimated the cost of this project would be $300million. I think now it’s probably going to be around $350million.”

Rain, however, was only the initial problem. After the summerdownpour, PNGTS apparently tried to speed up construction and washit with a barrage of letters from FERC officials citing poorconstruction techniques and lax clean-up activities.

“To the best of my knowledge there are no issues remaining withregulators,” said Anderson. “Everything is going great now. We havebeen under [regulatory] pressure to close up the front end and backend of our operations. I think both New Hampshire and Maine stateofficials and FERC wanted to get the clean-up speeded up, and wehave put a lot of folks on that. The regulators are satisfied butthey’re keeping a wicked close eye on us.”

Anderson said pipe construction still needs to be completed on a”short pipeline stretch” north of Westbrook, ME, and along the lastfew miles before the Canadian-U.S. border in New Hampshire.”There’s a lot of clean-up, some tie-ins. Most of our directionaldrills are completed. Most of our sensitive stream crossings havebeen completed and a few more will be done by the end of thisweek,” he said last Wednesday.

The 292-mile pipeline system will extend to a connection withTennessee Gas Pipeline in northern Massachusetts from a connectionwith an extension of the Trans Quebec &amp Maritimes Pipeline nearEast Hereford, PQ. The last 100-mile stretch between Portland, ME,and Dracut, MA, will be jointly owned with Maritimes and NortheastPipeline. The pipeline project is sponsored by an internationalconsortium of energy companies including subsidiaries of: Bay StateGas, El Paso Energy, Gaz Metropolitain, MCN Energy Group, NIPSCOIndustries, and TransCanada PipeLines. Rocco Canonica

©Copyright 1998 Intelligence Press, Inc. All rightsreserved. The preceding news report may not be republished orredistributed in whole or in part without prior written consent ofIntelligence Press, Inc.