Category: Pipelines

Texas shale reaching Houston through new pipeline project led by Magellan and Oxy. UPI/Gary C. Caskey HOUSTON, Sept. 30 (UPI) — An oil pipeline designed to transport as much as 300,000 barrels per day from the Permian shale basin in Texas is now in service, operators announced. Magellan Midstream Partners and Occidental Petroleum Corp. said its BridgeTex pipeline connecting the Permian basin to Houston refinery markets started commercial service. Construction of the pipeline began in November 2012. "Initial flow rates are expected to ramp up over time, as the BridgeTex Pipeline is capable of transporting up to 300,000 barrels per day of Permian Basin crude oil," the companies said in a Monday statement. Occidental, known by its stock ticker symbol Oxy, said in its second quarter financial statement Permian shale helped boost its oil production to 278,000 bpd, up more than 8 percent from second quarter 2013. The new […]

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NEW YORK, Sept 24 (Reuters) – Logic dictates that the United States will one day approve the northern leg of TransCanada Corp’s controversial Keystone XL crude oil pipeline, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper told an audience of executives in New York on Wednesday. "I’m not going to speculate on timelines other than to say the obvious benefits and merits of the project…. mean that the logic is it will be approved at some point in the future," he said. "I think its eventual approval under the right circumstances is inevitable." Harper also said that while increased U.S. oil production has changed the economics of the industry, the need for the pipeline has not vanished. "Obviously there’s been a great growth in United States energy production capacity. We view that as a good thing but … American self-sufficiency is a long way off," he said. The debate in the United […]

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A TransCanada Keystone Pipeline pump station operates outside Steele City, Neb., in this March 2014 file photo. Reuters WASHINGTON— TransCanada Corp.’s chief executive said the cost to build the Keystone XL pipeline, currently estimated at $5.4 billion, is expected to double by the time the U.S. government completes its review of the largest part of the project. Russ Girling, chief executive of the Calgary, Alberta,-based company, in an interview this week said he expects the project’s cost could increase to a "number that gets you into the high single digits to a 10 number." He was hesitant to say the project’s cost could double. "I was actually trying to avoid saying those words," Mr. Girling said. "Obviously, the costs have increased significantly." The pipeline, which would send Canadian oil sands to the Gulf Coast, has faced delays and has become a political flash point in the nation’s debate over […]

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LINCOLN, Nebraska, Sept 5 (Reuters) – Nebraska’s Supreme Court heard arguments on Friday about whether Governor Dave Heineman acted properly when he blessed a route for the Keystone XL oil pipeline, and the court’s decision could weigh on the controversial project. A lawyer for landowners who may be in the pipeline’s path hoped to persuade the seven-member panel that Heineman overreached and that a decision on the route should be left to an independent state agency. The 30-minute hearing played out in the court’s somber wood-paneled chamber. Keystone opponents who watched the proceedings from an adjacent room, were not so subdued. "It just makes sense, how can they not see that," said Shannon Graves, a Nebraska landowner who opposes the plan and was in the viewing room. At issue was a 2012 law that gave Heineman authority to approve a route for TransCanada Corp’s proposed $5.4 billion pipeline. The […]

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Columbia Gas Transmission (CGT), part of NiSource Inc.’s Columbia Pipeline Group , will build a 160-mile natural gas pipeline , Leach XPress, in Ohio and West Virginia, supporting gas supply development in western Pennsylvania, northern West Virginia, and eastern Ohio. Long-term firm service agreements with Range Resources Appalachia LLC, Noble Energy Inc., Kaiser Marketing Appalachian LLC, and American Energy-Utica LLC (AEU), support the project. CGT describes the 1.5-bcfd pipeline as providing access to multiple Marcellus and Utica receipt points and establishing a new header system serving the Appalachian supply basin. It will interconnect with NiSource’s Columbia Gulf Transmission pipeline in Leach, Ky. The same four shippers are also underpinning Columbia Gulf’s Rayne XPress project, which will boost the line’s capacity by 1 bcfd through additional compression. AEU recently completed acquisition of 27,000 net acres in Monroe County, Ohio ( OGJ Online, Aug. 5, 2014 ). CGT has begun outreach […]

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The Supreme Court of Nebraska plans to hear arguments the first week of September in the state’s appeal of a property rights case that could block the Keystone XL pipeline, which will likely push any White House decision on Keystone’s approval until after the mid-term elections, according to people familiar with the case. But the forthcoming September arguments, first reported Wednesday by the Washington Post , could move the court’s decision forward according to attorneys close to the issue. If the justices grant the appeal, which would approved the pipeline’s route through Nebraska, before the date of the elections, it could be an unwanted October surprise for President Barack Obama . The president has been under increasing pressure this year to approve Keystone from the energy industry,  Republicans, and most importantly, incumbent Democratic Senators including Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Mark Warner of Virginia who are running […]

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While bipartisan leaders in a Senate committee passed a bill in support of Keystone XL, Sen. warned against overselling the win. Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Sens. Mary Landrieu , D-La., and John Hoeven , R-N.D., moved their bill in support of the pipeline through the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee with a 12-10 vote. "I am pleased to move the issue of the Keystone XL pipeline forward, but I think we need to be cautious not to oversell it," Murkowski said in a statement Wednesday. The measure is nearly identical to similar efforts to push Keystone XL past President Obama ‘s desk. Murkowski said her counterparts in the House have already passed similar legislation, but noted Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid , D-Nev., has largely ignored the issue on the Senate floor. Pipeline planner TransCanada issued a permit request for the pipeline more than five years […]

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As he announced his support for it, US Sen. John A. Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said the Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s vote on Chairwoman Mary L. Landrieu’s (D-La.) bill to bypass the White House and approve the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline “seems more like a cheerleading exercise than a meaningful effort to get Keystone built.” Barrasso said he thinks it’s unlikely Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) would bring Landrieu’s bill to the floor despite the committee’s approving it by 12 to 10 votes, and Landrieu and Ranking Minority Member Lisa Murkowski’s (R-Alas.) statements they would press him to do so. “The undeniable fact is there is already a bill on the Senate Calendar which would approve the Keystone XL pipeline,” Barrasso said, noting that a similar measure by another member of the committee, John Hoeven (R-ND), has 55 Republican and Democratic cosponsors, and has been pending on […]

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