Questar declared an OFO late Thursday afternoon, saying that effective immediately until further notice, it is “requiring shippers and point operators to have production volumes match accepted nominations exactly, with zero tolerance allowed.” Due to a shut-in test at Clay Basin storage facility that began last Thursday and will run through Wednesday, Questar’s Clay Basin balancing account is not available. Questar said its system “is operating at close to capacity and the injection test [conducted last Wednesday] has placed added burden on operating conditions, resulting in minimal linepack being available for balancing.” See the bulletin board for more OFO information. Questar also said Friday that beginning Thursday (Oct. 19), all customers under the PAL1 rate schedule must withdraw all parked gas in their accounts at Clay Basin. It will contact each PAL1 customer individually about its required schedule of withdrawals.

CIG implemented a Strained Operating Condition (SOC) for its system Friday, effective until further notice. “Because the system is operating at an extremely high load factor to support primary firm transportation, CIG does not have the ability to absorb imbalances caused by mismatches between scheduled receipts and deliveries or those imbalances arising from variations in actual gas flow from scheduled quantities,” the pipeline said. “Further, because storage inventories are currently at or near the reservoir guidelines…CIG will have limited ability to handle storage injections in excess of each storage shipper’s Available Daily Injection Quantity (ADIQ) or inventory levels above Maximum Available Capacity (MAC).” While the SOC is in effect, CIG will require all transportation transactions to be in balance between receipts and deliveries. It also said all storage customers should adjust flowing supplies to ensure that injections remain at or below current ADIQ limits. See the bulletin board for other SOC details.

Saying its storage inventory is “at unprecedented levels with a month remaining in the injection season,” Texas Eastern expressed concern Friday about its ability to preserve flexibility and manage day-to-day pipeline operations as storage continues to fill. Texas Eastern added that it must have the cooperation of customers, meter operators and producers to maintain favorable operating conditions and prevent the issuance of Action Alerts or OFOs. The pipeline continues to require that all parties resolve due-shipper imbalances, and to refrain from resolving due-pipe imbalances or creating due-shipper imbalances. “The imbalance Action Alert/Operational Flow Orders that are currently being contemplated will apply to the holders of any rate schedule on the Texas Eastern system where shippers or point operators could adversely impact operations by either undertaking deliveries or overtendering receipts,” it said.

Gulfstream said last week that based on recent operations, it has experienced actual receipts that exceed actual deliveries out of the system, increasing its linepack above normal operating levels. It asked shippers to stay in balance and said it will not schedule any due-pipeline imbalance make-ups until further notice. It also asked parties with due-shipper imbalances to resolve them as soon as practicable.

Westcoast changed its imbalance tolerance range to the normal 10% pack/10% draft Saturday from the previous zero pack/20% draft.

Sea Robin Pipeline said Friday an outage of the Hess-operated Sea Robin Processing Plant that began Wednesday has been extended through Monday (Oct. 16).

Dominion told shippers Friday it is again performing work on the Lincoln Heights storage recycling system in Westmoreland County, PA that should be completed by the end of November, barring unforeseen circumstances. Until then, all local production tied to this system must be shut in, Dominion said.

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