IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) has listed the Pine Prairie gas storage facility in Evangeline Parish, LA, as a gas market hub on the ICE over-the-counter (OTC) trading platform.

Pine Prairie is owned by PAA Natural Gas Storage LLC (PNGS), which is indirectly owned 50% by Plains All American Pipeline LP and 50% by Vulcan Capital.

“The listing of Pine Prairie Hub as a trading point by ICE is a meaningful step in the evolution of our Pine Prairie franchise,” said PNGS President Dean Liollio. “ICE is a well respected market platform that offers customers price discovery and the ability to buy and sell natural gas at a variety of physical market hubs throughout North America.

“The addition of Pine Prairie to the ICE system facilitates our customers’ ability to efficiently utilize their leased storage and wheeling capacity at Pine Prairie to balance their systemwide natural gas needs and improves the liquidity of the Pine Prairie facility.”

PNGS owns and operates approximately 40 Bcf of storage capacity at its Bluewater facility in Michigan and Pine Prairie facility in South Louisiana, with an additional 8 Bcf under construction. The joint venture has filed a permit for an additional 24 Bcf of capacity at Pine Prairie (see Daily GPI, Feb. 17).

In early 2007 an additional 240 acres of land adjacent to the Pine Prairie project was acquired in order to provide space for future expansions of up to an additional 11 salt caverns, bringing ultimate working gas capacity to 112 Bcf (see Daily GPI, Jan. 24, 2007).

In a recent report the Energy Information Administration noted that the number of natural gas market centers in the United States is expected to grow in the coming years due to the development of unconventional natural gas plays and new pipeline infrastructure to serve them (see Daily GPI, April 27).

©Copyright 2009Intelligence Press Inc. All rights reserved. The preceding news reportmay not be republished or redistributed, in whole or in part, in anyform, without prior written consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.