Brazos

Tulsa-based pipeline giant Williams is teaming up with Permian Basin pure-play Brazos Midstream to expand their natural gas and crude oil footprint in West Texas.

Brazos Midstream Holdings LLC and financial sponsor Old Ironsides Energy have agreed to sell subsidiaries working on developing the Permian Delaware sub-basin to North Haven Infrastructure Partners II (NHIP II) for about $1.75 billion. Closing is expected by the end of June. NHIP II is an investment fund managed by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure. After closing, Brazos would retain its name and management team, and it would operate as a portfolio company of NHIP II. Brazos is expanding cryogenic natural gas processing in West Texas, among other things. Jefferies LLC is financial adviser to Brazos, while RBC Capital Markets is financial adviser to Morgan Stanley Infrastructure.

Three former employees of Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway Ltd.were acquitted on charges related to aJuly 2013 derailmentof a 73-car train carrying crude oil that resulted in the deaths of 47 people in Lac-Megantic in eastern Quebec. Following more than a week of deliberations, a jury found the train’s conductor and two other men not guilty of criminal negligence, according to reports. The train had been carrying oil from the western U.S. to a refinery in New Brunswick. In the aftermath of the disaster, both theUnited StatesandCanadamoved to end crude oil deliveries using legacy DOT-111 railway tank cars.

Brazos Midstream Holdings LLC subsidiaries have purchased Callon Petroleum Co.’s natural gas gathering system in the Permian Basin of West Texas and signed a long-term, fee-based agreement with the producer for gathering and processing services.

Brazos Midstream Holdings LLC has completed multiple crude oil and gas gathering and processing projects in the southern Delaware Basin, a subbasin of the Permian Basin that is one of the most active oil- and gas-producing basins in the United States. Brazos commenced operation of a new 60 MMcf/d gas processing plant (Comanche I), several new compressor stations and 150 miles of large-diameter, low- and high-pressure gas gathering pipelines. The project also included the construction of 35 miles of crude oil gathering pipelines, two crude oil storage terminals with a combined capacity of 50,000 bbl and connections to multiple downstream crude oil pipelines. Brazos also has begun construction of a second gas processing plant (Comanche II), which will add 200 MMcf/d of capacity. Comanche II is expected to be operational during the first quarter of 2018 and will increase Brazos’ total operated processing capacity in the Delaware Basin to 260 MMcf/d.

VOC Brazos Energy Partners LP has struck a joint venture agreement with Hawkwood Energy East Texas LLC to develop the lower Eaglebine interval, also referred to as the Lower Woodbine Organic Shale (LWOS), within the southern half of the Kurten Woodbine Unit (contract area). The JV will recommence the Brazos horizontal LWOS drilling development program. Under the terms, Hawkwood Energy may carry VOC Brazos for its share of drilling and completion costs for up to four LWOS wells (earning wells), with the first to be spud by Dec. 31, 2017 and the fourth to be spud by Jan. 1, 2019. In exchange, Hawkwood Energy would earn a working interest representing 50% of VOC Brazos’ interest in each earning well and up to a 50% interest in VOC Brazos’ acreage in the contract area. Hawkwood Energy also would have the right to propose and drill up to eight LWOS wells per year in the contract area after the earning wells are completed.

Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America (Natural) is seeking to abandon Texas-Oklahoma pipeline and related facilities it says are failing and no longer needed by firm shippers except for one power generator that has yet to reach agreement with the company.