With competing open seasons for a gasline from Alaska’s North Slope to Serve Lower 48 markets drawing near, FERC last Thursday issued a final rule that aligns terminology in standards of conduct for Alaska gas pipeline project open season participants to be consistent with the Commission’s Order No. 717.

In Order No. 717 the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) eliminated the concept of energy affiliates and the corporate separation approach (from FERC’s Order No. 2004) in favor of the employee functional approach used in Order Nos. 497 and 889.

“The Commission’s goal…was to prevent unduly discriminatory behavior and limit the ability of a project applicant for an Alaska natural gas transportation project to unduly favor its affiliates in the open season process,” the order [RM05-1-002] noted. “The Commission sought to do this by applying certain of the Standards of Conduct requirements of Order No. 2004 to all project applicants conducting open seasons…because this would minimize the risk that an affiliate of a project applicant would have an advantage over non-affiliates in obtaining capacity through the open season.”

In amending its regulations, FERC said it is not increasing or decreasing the amount of information required to be collected under its Alaska gasline open season regulations.

“These changes are being made in order to render the open season regulations consistent with the Commission’s current Standards of Conduct by reconciling references to the specific Standards of Conduct with which a project sponsor conducting an open season for…must comply,” the order said. “In large measure, the amendments made in this instant rule do not impose obligations on any Alaska natural gas transportation project applicants that are different than the obligations imposed under the current open season regulations. Rather than being substantive in nature, this rulemaking merely reconciles the references to specific requirements under the Standards of Conduct imposed under Order No. 2004, with those requirements as they now appear in the Standards of Conduct as result of Order No. 717.”

The rule will take effect 30 days after its publication in the Federal Register.

The Alaska Pipeline Project — the gasline proposed by TransCanada Corp. and ExxonMobil Corp. — filed its open season plan with FERC in January (see NGI, Feb. 1). If FERC approves the plan, the Alaska Pipeline Project will finalize its open season offering and provide it to potential shippers at the end of April for their assessment during the 90-day period through July, project backers said.

The competing Denali — The Alaska Gas Pipeline LLC, a venture of BP and ConocoPhillips, said in January it would hold its open season in April (see NGI, Jan. 18).

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