FERC staff plans to issue the environmental review in spring 2017 for the 1.3-MMDth/d WB XPress project to bolster Columbia Pipeline Group Inc.'s mid-Atlantic gas infrastructure.

In a Dec. 9 notice, the commission released the staff's planned schedule for the environmental assessment. The staff intends to issue the assessment March 24. Cooperating federal agencies would then have until June 22 to complete their own work on the project review.

Columbia Gas Transmission LLC applied for the project Dec. 30, 2015. At the time, the expansion project was originally expected to begin in January 2017 and had two in-service dates, with one part of the project planned to come online in June 2018 and the remaining portions by the end of November 2018.

The bidirectional project would increase the capacity of Columbia's pipeline system by 1.3 MMDth/d with the replacement of 26.2 miles of pipeline and the installation of 3.1 miles of pipe. The additional capacity has been contracted through binding precedent agreements with a large local distribution company and producers.

The project would also include two new compressor stations, modifications and alterations to seven compressor stations, and other aboveground facilities in West Virginia and Virginia.

The pipeline would be installed in Fairfax County, Va., and Grant, Hardy, Kanawha, Pendleton and Randolph counties in West Virginia.

Columbia Gas is a Columbia Pipeline Group company. (FERC docket CP16-38)