With two of its shippers taking released capacity instead of newspace, Northern Border has filed a request with FERC to downsizeits proposed Indiana extension project, Project 2000, and reducethe expected costs by $64 million. The reduction would mean asmaller rate increase, under rolled-in rate design, than would haveoccurred in the original project plan – a 2.06% rise versus 2.39%.

Northern Border said El Paso Energy and Minnesota CornProcessors have obtained firm capacity via capacity releases. ElPaso has signed an agreement for 51 MMcf/d from theMontana-Saskatchewan border near Port of Morgan to Ventura, IA, and10 MMcf/d from Ventura to Harper, IA. Minnesota Corn Processorsalso found released capacity between Port of Morgan and Ventura.

The company filed a request to amend its application for acertificate (Docket No. CP99-21) and reduce the amount of proposednew compression by about 30,500 hp from the original 53,000 hp. The34-mile, 36-inch diameter extension to a connection with NIPSCO atNorth Hayden, IN, from Manhattan, IL, is still required, and thescheduled in-service date of the facilities remains November 2000.But the capacity of the system will be 1,484 MMcf/d between Venturaand Harper, 844 MMcf/d between Harper and Manhattan and 544 MMcf/don the Indiana extension.

The revised shipper list, with purchased capacity to NorthHayden, includes El Paso (52.1 MMcf/d), Bethlehem Steel (30MMcf/d), NIPSCO (165 MMcf/d), Peoples Energy (101.2 MMcf/d) andPeoples Gas Light &amp Coke (200 MMcf/d).

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