Operator Northern Natural Gas declared force majeure after detecting a leak in the 20-inch mainline of Matagorda Offshore Pipeline System (MOPS) near the platform at Mustang Island 787. Offshore maintenance crews were responding, NNG said in a bulletin board posting late Thursday afternoon, and the Mustang Island 782, 785, 787, 803 and A-16 receipt points were to be shut in sometime during Friday’s gas day. Duration of the outage has not yet been determined, it said.

Questar began performing measurement inspections Wednesday at 14 points. The inspections, slated to run through Aug. 6, will interrupt gas flow at each point for up to four hours, but Questar intends to keep nominations whole during the work.

Sonat will begin maintenance Saturday on Line 26 (the 6-inch East Dougherty Line) that will last from six days to three weeks. The outage will be declared a force majeure and require that shippers be allocated about 28% of their firm service entitlements at the Sylvester, Ashburn, Tifton #1, Tifton #2, Douglas, Ocilla and Fitzgerald delivery points. In addition, noting that since May 3 the Olga (LA) Compressor Station has had one unit at a time down for scheduled maintenance, Sonat said that from Saturday through Aug. 10 all Olga units will be unavailable due to required station maintenance. Capacity on the Main Pass 26-inch line will be reduced by about 20,000-40,000 Dth/d throughout this period, Sonat said, but no impact to firm receipts is expected. However, shippers may experience reductions in the amount of interruptible nominations (A-1 and/or IT) that are scheduled.

Tennessee reported being informed by Sonat that due to required maintenance, processing capability at the Toca I plant in southeast Louisiana will be reduced by 750 MMcf/d (about 75%) for two to three weeks starting Sunday. Customers wanting to divert their gas to Tennessee utilizing either the South Pass 55 or Venice Interconnect meters during this outage must get a processing agreement at the Yscloskey plant prior to Sunday’s gas flow, Tennessee said. Call Tim Thiel with Dynegy Midstream/Yscloskey at (713) 507-3911 for additional processing agreement information.

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