Kinder Morgan announces open season on proposed Texas pipeline

US midstream company Kinder Morgan has announced an open season for a new natural gas pipeline proposed for Texas, linking production zones in the Permian basin to the Agua Dulce gas hub close to the US-Mexico border.

The 430-mile project, known as Gulf Coast Express Pipeline, will transport up to 1.7m dekatherms (Dth) – 1.63 billion cubic feet (bcf) or 46.3 million cubic metres – per day of natural gas from the Waha gas hub in west Texas to Agua Dulce, Kinder Morgan said in a press release.

The pipeline is proposed to meet growing demand for LNG exports and demand into Mexico.

Natural gas supply will be sourced from multiple locations, including existing receipt points along Kinder Morgan’s Texas Pipeline and El Paso Natural Gas pipeline systems. Interconnections with the 1.3bcf/day Trans-Pecos pipeline and other intrastate infrastructure close to Waha are also under consideration.

At Agua Dulce, the pipeline will connect to Kinder Morgan’s own Tejas and Border pipelines as well as the existing 2.1bcf/day NET Mexico header, all of which feed into Mexico. A further interconnect with Spectra Energy’s 2.6bcf/day Valley Crossing pipeline, which will feed into the offshore Texas-Tuxpan pipeline being constructed by IEnova and TransCanada is also proposed.

The project is to come online by the second half of 2019, pending shipper commitments. Non-binding open season bids are to be submitted to Kinder Morgan between 22 March and 20 April 2017.

Waha and Agua Dulce are set to become the two largest hubs for US gas delivered into Mexico through the coming years, with over 9bcf/day in combined export capacity in place across the two locations by 2019. james.fowler@icis.com