Sunoco to Pipeline WV NGL thru Lancaster Co. PA
From an Article by Dean Evans, Lancaster County, PA, November 21, 2013
A decommissioned underground pipeline that once carried gasoline across the state and through Lancaster County could see new life from the Marcellus shale gas boom.
“Mariner East 1 is a project to transport natural gas liquids (NGLs), also called liquefied petroleum gases (LPGs) from the Marcellus and Utica shales in Western Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia to the Marcus Hook Industrial Complex on the Pennsylvania/Delaware border,” says Sunoco representative Jeff Shields.
The Mariner East 1 project would stretch from a Sunoco facility just outside Houston, Pa., in Chartiers Township, Washington County, to its transportation hub in Marcus Hook, Delaware County, or a distance of about 300 miles.
NGLs such as propane, ethane and butane are classified as “wet gas” because they are products of the process known a hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.” The untainted, natural-gas methane is classified as a “dry gas.”
Sunoco plans to begin transporting propane through the new Mariner East 1 pipeline by the second second half of 2014, and both ethane and propane by mid-2015.
Shields explained that “the work being done on existing Mariner East 1 pipeline in places like West Cocalico Township involves integrity testing and valve replacement — we are replacing any existing valves and replacing pipe in places our testing has determined an upgrade is needed.” Sunoco is “still evaluating sites for the pump station.”
“The project is mostly existing pipeline, except for 50 miles of new pipeline being installed between the beginning of the pipe outside of Houston, Pa., to our terminal outside of Delmont, Pa.,” Shields says.
The pipeline is ideal for the transportation of the liquid gas because of its termination in Marcus Hook, which has deepwater berths on the Delaware River for transporting the products to regional and foreign markets.
The Mariner East 1 pipeline should eventually reach a capacity of 70,000 barrels a day. Once that happens, Sunoco could look at installing a second, entirely new pipeline to meet product demand. But Shields said that project is only a proposal at this point.
“Mariner East 2 would parallel that right of way wherever possible, though we may need to acquire additional right of way and/or temporary work space to lay the pipe in certain areas,” Shields wrote in the email.
“We have never broken out a cost for Mariner East 1. What we have put out as cost is “More than $600 million” combined for both Mariner East 1 and Mariner West, with the bulk of that being spent in Pennsylvania.”
Shields wrote that Mariner West is a project that is scheduled to begin shipping ethane this month from western Pennsylvania through Ohio and Michigan to Sarnia, Ontario, Canada.
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