3 TETCO Pipelines in Kentucky Shut Down (for Now) Following Blast
One week ago the Texas Eastern Pipeline Company (TETCO) pipeline running through Kentucky exploded for the second time in a year (see Texas Eastern Pipeline Explodes in Kentucky…Again). The Marcellus/Utica gas flowing through TETCO in that area had been flowing at 1.33 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d). It’s now flowing at zero. When will gas flows return to at least one of the three TETCO lines running through Kentucky?
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This is getting ridiculous. Does anyone really believe that a single pipeline project already built and now getting a redo could possibly have racked up 680 “violations” during construction work over the past five months? We certainly don’t believe it. Yet that’s what the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) alleges. Energy Transfer (ET), the builder and fixer of Revolution, has their own allegation: The DEP itself is “not in compliance with its own guidelines.” Who inspects the inspectors for compliance?
Rahm Emanuel (Democrat), former Mayor of Chicago and former Chief of Staff in the Bill Clinton White House, once famously quipped, “You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.” Emanuel’s fellow Democrats who control 10 states plus the District of Columbia are taking his advice. The AGs from each of those states sent a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) yesterday asking FERC to delay approving any new pipeline projects until the virus pandemic is over.
Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a 303-mile Marcellus/Utica gas pipeline from West Virginia to southern Virginia, is 90% built and in the ground. The final 10% is waiting on various lawsuits and regulatory agencies to resolve outstanding issues brought on by radicalized green groups. One of the places the pipeline has long been done and in the ground is Lewis County, WV. It’s a mountainous area. Inspectors recently discovered there have been “slips” of the land resulting in “at least three locations” where MVP has shifted.
On Tuesday MDN told you that the Texas Eastern Pipeline Company (TETCO) pipeline running through Kentucky had exploded for a second time in a year (see 
Williams, the midstream/pipeline giant with major operations and assets in the Marcellus Shale, released its first-quarter update and held a conference call with analysts yesterday. The company wrote down the value of several projects, including the Constitution Pipeline, which led to a paper loss of $518 million in 1Q20. That’s the bad news. The good news is that the Marcellus (which Williams calls its Northeast G&P segment) saw revenues rise 23% in 1Q20.
Dominion Energy issued its first-quarter 2020 update yesterday showing the company had a paper loss (due to impairments) of $270 million in 1Q. Given the company wrote down $2.6 billion worth of assets, losing $270 million on paper seems pretty darned good. Dominion is a BIG company with lots of different businesses. It is a midstream/pipeline company, a power generation company, and a utility delivering power to end-users. Lots of fingers, lots of pies. The one thing we were looking for in this update is new info about the company’s 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) from the Marcellus/Utica to Virginia and North Carolina.
Two weeks ago MDN told you about Virginia Natural Gas (VNG) and their request for state permission to build 24 miles of new pipeline and two new compressor stations (expanding a third compressor), connecting to the mighty Transco pipeline system to flow Marcellus/Utica gas to the northeast Va. region (see 
If an upstream (drilling) company with a long-term pipeline contract files for bankruptcy, does that give the company the right to break their pipeline contract? A major shipper on the Rockies Express (REX) pipeline, Ultra Resources, is expected to file for bankruptcy very soon. REX is concerned Ultra may claim its bankruptcy is a “get-out-of-the-contract free” card. REX has asked FERC to preemptively “assert its jurisdiction” as the arbiter of whether or not companies like Ultra can skip out of contracts.
Last week MDN told you that the second phase of Sabal Trail, a $3.2 billion, 515-mile interstate natural gas pipeline in Florida, Georgia, and Alabama to deliver (in part) Marcellus gas to the southeast was approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and is coming online now (see 
Energy Transfer’s Revolution Pipeline runs through Bulter, Beaver, Allegheny, and Washington counties in southwest PA. The 24-inch gathering pipeline shifted and exploded in September 2018, just as it was entering service (see 
The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (DC Circuit) heard oral arguments yesterday in a case of major importance to the future of all federally-approved pipeline projects. The case revolves around the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) use of something called a tolling order in approving Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline (in the PA Marcellus). Big Green groups launched the lawsuit in an effort to strip away FERC’s right to use tolling orders when considering requests to “rehear” decisions to approve pipelines.
Great news! The Mariner East 2 pipeline project along with Shell’s mighty ethane cracker project will once again be able to restart their stopped construction. At least according to our reading of the law. As you may know the Pennsylvania Dept. of Community and Economic Development (DCED) has been “reviewing” waiver requests to allow all work to resume for both ME2 and the cracker project (see