Pipeline opponents asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission not to issue emergency certificates for Sabal Trail and the up to 1.1-Bcf/d Southeast Market Pipelines project, hoping for a court-ordered shutdown, but power companies that move natural gas on the pipeline system supported the emergency authorizations.
Sabal Trail Transmission LLC and other developers of the three components of the 685-mile Southeast Market Pipelines project had asked FERC for the emergency authorizations on Feb. 2, after the U.S. Appeals Court for the D.C. Circuit upheld its earlier decision to vacate the original certificate orders for the project based on an incomplete environmental review. (U.S. Appeals Court for the D.C. Circuit docket 16-1329)
Environmental groups and a property owner made their arguments against the emergency authorizations on Feb. 5. The Sierra Club claimed stopping the gas flow would not interrupt service to pipeline customers. The group and its allies also said FERC cannot solely rely on the draft supplemental environmental impact statement the commission prepared for the project to comply with the first D.C. Circuit decision. The group said the supplement was inadequate. FERC issued a final supplemental environmental impact statement on Feb. 5 that kept most of the draft.
"FERC has not yet addressed many previous objections to the incorrect and inadequate draft supplemental environmental impact statement," the WWALS Watershed Coalition said in its motion to the commission.
A Georgia landowner, G.B.A. Associates, made similar requests to the environmental groups. It said the pipeline project had hurt its property during construction. FERC asked Sabal Trail on Feb. 6 for additional information on impacts to stakeholder properties.
Pipeline customers supported emergency authorizations to keep Southeast Market Pipelines running and disputed the Sierra Club argument that there would be no service interruptions if the system did shut down. Florida Power & Light Co., an anchor shipper, said it uses the pipeline capacity to provide service in Florida. The pipeline will exclusively serve the Okeechobee Clean Energy Center Unit 1, a 1,750-MW gas-fired plant under construction in Okeechobee County, Fla. The power company subscribes to 400,000 MMcf/d on the pipeline, which will increase to 600,000 MMcf/d on May 1, 2020.
"The ability to use these pipelines during cold weather not only helped facilitate [Florida Power & Light] meeting its native load requirements but ... was able to assist other entities experiencing extreme cold weather and high electric demand," Florida Power & Light President and CEO Eric Silagy said in a Feb. 5 letter to FERC. "In fact, [Florida Power & Light] is greatly concerned that without the [project], it will be unable to provide this reliability service to other utilities in Florida during the remainder of the winter season and the upcoming summer season."
Duke Energy Florida LLC, a pipeline customer and affiliate with one of the pipeline project developers, also asked FERC for pipeline authorizations on Feb. 5. It said any interruption of service would result in adverse impacts for electric utility customers. A shutdown could mean "severe price spikes" for customers or an "inability to meet peak demands," according to Duke Energy Florida President Harry Sideris.
The Southeast Market Pipelines will be the only service provider for Duke Energy's 1,640-MW Citrus combined-cycle power plant, currently under construction. Duke Energy plans to bring the power plant online as it retires two coal units in 2018.
The Southeast Market Pipelines project is a three-piece line running through Alabama, Georgia and Florida. The project is composed of the Sabal Trail pipeline, a joint venture of Enbridge Inc., NextEra Energy Inc. and Duke Energy Corp.; the Hillabee expansion of Williams Partners LP's Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co. LLC; and NextEra's Florida Southeast Connection project. FERC authorized developers to put the first part of the Sabal Trail pipeline and other portions of the Southeast Market Pipelines project in service in June 2017. (FERC docket CP14-554, et al.)
