Owners

The Department of Transportation (DOT) is calling on owners and operators of recently constructed large-diameter natural gas pipelines and hazardous liquid pipelines to examine their systems for potential girth weld defects.

The Department of Transportation (DOT) is calling on owners and operators of recently constructed large-diameter natural gas pipelines and hazardous liquid pipelines to examine their systems for potential girth weld defects.

Offshore lease owners and operators will be subject to new fees to recover costs of inspections conducted during fiscal 2010, the Department of Interior’s Minerals Management Service (MMS) said.

The Department of Justice has filed a complaint and consent order in a federal court in North Carolina that requires El Paso Natural Gas Co. and successor owners of a contaminated textile plant site in the state to pay $1.61 million for remediation and other costs incurred by the federal government.

The Department of Transportation (DOT) has issued an advisory bulletin urging owners and operators of liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants to be vigilant in securing their facilities in the wake of the breach at KeySpan Corp.’s Lynn, MA, storage site in August.

ANR reported being informed by owners and/or operators of the processing plants that service its Southeast Area that based on their current analysis of processing economics for April, most will not process gas unless the pipeline issues a gas quality requirement. Thus ANR is establishing a hydrocarbon dew point limit of 20 degrees Fahrenheit for Southeast receipts, effective April 1-30. Meters delivering into ANR that exceed the dew point limit and are upstream of a processing plant must have their gas treated. “Evidence of a valid processing arrangement with a downstream processing plant must be made available to ANR upon request,” the pipeline said. ANR will post the hydrocarbon dew point for all Southeast receipt meters delivering into its system. It had taken the same action for March (see Daily GPI, Feb. 27).

Interstate natural gas pipelines, electric utility transmission owners and local distribution companies believe FERC has gone over-board in its proposed rule that would completely wall off regulated transportation and transmission companies from their unregulated affiliates to stamp out market-power abuses, while shippers and consumers — who would benefit most from the stricter rule — think the Commission has struck the right balance.

Interstate natural gas pipelines, electric utility transmission owners and local distribution companies believe FERC has gone over-board in its proposed rule that would completely wall off the regulated transportation/transmission companies from their unregulated affiliates to prevent the exercise of market power, while shippers and consumers — who would benefit most from the stricter rule — think the Commission has struck the right balance.

BP and Shell, owners of Destin Pipeline and other large deepwater Gulf of Mexico pipes, announced plans to build a $150-million ultra-deepwater line to gather gas from fields that are 150 miles offshore in the Gulf. The 100-mile Okeanos gas pipeline will have a capacity of at least 1 Bcf/d and will be the first Gulf of Mexico gas pipeline built to operate in water depths exceeding 6,000 feet, making it the deepest gas gathering system in the Gulf.