New Ohio-Gulf Coast pipeline approved

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FERC

Texas Eastern's pipeline would extend from the Kensington processing plant in Columbiana County to an interconnection with Texas Eastern’s system in Monroe County.

Tom Knox

Reporter- Columbus Business First

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Federal regulators have approved a $468.5 million eastern Ohio pipeline project to send natural gas from Ohio to the Gulf Coast.

Texas Eastern, a subsidiary of Houston-based Spectra Energy Corp. (NYSE:SE), in February lined up four companies to use its 76-mile long pipeline extension, but had not yet received final confirmation from the agency that oversees interstate pipelines.

Now, its Ohio Pipeline Energy Network– or Open Project – can go forward. Houston-based Spectra hopes the project is done at the end of 2015.

The project had to clear concerns and questions from environmental, landowner and government groups. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission reviewed them and approved the project Tuesday.

The pipeline will stretch from the Kensington processing plant in Columbiana County through Carroll, Jefferson and Belmont counties before ending in a Texas Eastern interconnection in Monroe County. Those four counties are where much of the Utica shale oil and gas activity is centered.

Texas Eastern would build a gas turbine compressor station in Belmont County and make adjustments to existing compressor centers to allow bidirectional flow.

Bidirectional pipelines are new and growing in Appalachia. Natural gas used to flow from the Gulf Coast to the eastern U.S., but increased production from Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia shale has led to those states exporting instead of importing natural gas.

The pipeline will carry up to 550,000 dekatherms of gas from the Utica and Marcellus shales to delivery points at the Egan Hub in Louisiana.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE:CHK), the most active gas producer in Ohio, notched the biggest commitment to pipeline earlier this year. Consol Energy (NYSE:CNX), Rice Energy (NYSE:RICE) and Total Gas & Power North America have also signed on.

The Texas Eastern pipeline system has more than 9,200 miles of pipe across the U.S.