Opponents of Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. LLC’s Northeast Energy Direct (NED) — and everyone else — have about another week to comment on the project at FERC. The commission extended the comment period to Jan. 15 to make up for technical difficulties with its eFiling system that prevented some document submissions over the holidays.

Electronic filings, as opposed to paper, are strongly encouraged by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, it said in its Monday notice of the deadline extension [CP16-21]. The comment period was to have ended Wednesday (Jan. 6).

Apparently, the public had a lot left to say about the controversial Kinder Morgan Inc. project over the holidays. As of Tuesday morning, there were about 400 comments and motions to intervene posted in the docket since Monday.

NED, which would create new transportation capacity to deliver natural gas to New England markets — particularly power generators but also local distribution companies — has been heavily criticized by regional landowners, local governments and some New England state officials (see Daily GPI, Dec. 31, 2015).

The project’s FERC certificate filing was made in November (see Daily GPI, Nov. 20, 2015).