The decision by Enterprise Products Partners LP to bring aboard the former president of the Oneok Energy Partners interstate pipeline group and the ex-chief of El Paso Corp.’s natural gas marketing and trading business may offer a few clues as to what the partnership is planning as it smoothes the groundwork for new gas pipelines, processing plants and a deepwater production platform that will ramp up over the next year.

Former Oneok interstate executive Christopher R. Skoog was tapped to lead Enterprise’s Natural Gas Services and Marketing Group, a new entity unveiled in March (see NGI, March 12). As senior vice president, Skoog will carry responsibility for all of the partnership’s existing gas supply and marketing activities, which are centered in North America, including supply, origination and optimization. Tony C. Chovanec, who most recently played an integral role in El Paso’s production marketing and long-term marketing arrangements, will be the No. 2 man.

Skoog and Chovanec arrive at an opportune time. Enterprise’s gas pipelines, processors and production platforms now handle more than 10 Bcf/d, or about 20% of the daily U.S. gas production from the Lower 48 states. This year alone, about $2.5 billion of projects are expected to ramp up. Projects now under development or near completion include:

“We’ve had so much going on in the way of growth, a lot of things going on, and we really needed to establish that infrastructure within the company,” spokesman Rick Rainey told NGI. “Our primary goal is to promote the optimization of the assets we have. We are not becoming a trading business, and we won’t be involved with pricing, but we want to maximize what we have.”

Enterprise made good on its intention to enter the interstate pipe market in May after Enterprise GP Holdings LP captured a minority stake in Energy Transfer Equity LP and TEPPCO Partners LP (see NGI, May 14). The deal nearly doubled the value of the Enterprise GP, which went from a $3.5 billion business to a nearly $6 billion business. And with that deal, Rainey noted that Enterprise is now the leading midstream operator in the country, with an estimated enterprise value of about $19 billion. Ten-year-old Enterprise nudged former leader Kinder Morgan Energy Partners (KMP) from the top spot; KMP is worth an estimated $16 billion.

“We have a very strong midstream business, but we’re always looking for opportunities to add value,” he said. “Acquisitions have been part of our strategy. From a practical standpoint, we’re always looking for opportunities either alone or with other partners to acquire.” Rainey said Enterprise is now “entering a new area with interstate. We didn’t have it, and now we have a fairly sizable interest.”

In the Rockies, Enterprise’s Jonah/Pinedale gathering system topped 1.5 Bcf/d in the first quarter of the year, which was a high-volume mark for the system. Its Bridger compressor station Phase I project will be mechanically complete in the next few weeks, and altogether the capacity increase and pressure reduction project has begun to benefit EnCana Corp., Enterprise’s largest producer in the Rockies.

Enterprise also has about 1,000 employees and contractors working on the Meeker I cryoplant project, which is set for a late summer start-up following a few weeks of start-up processing. In addition, Enterprise is constructing a central treating plant for ExxonMobil Corp. in the Piceance Basin; construction work on that project began in the spring (see NGI, Nov. 27, 2006).

Offshore, if Enterprise’s Independence Hub and pipeline prove as successful in operation as they appear on paper, “it will change the business model for deepwater development,” said Rainey. “The hub allows both large operators and small operators to be involved in the deepwater. Now we have a blueprint,” and he said he would not be surprised to see similar hubs in other parts of the Gulf of Mexico deepwater. “When you look to the east of Independence, Lease [Sale] Area 181, it opens up a lot of opportunities” (see Daily GPI, Dec. 27, 2006).

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