Plans for still another natural gas market center are taking shape in the U.S.
Units of Consolidated Natural Gas Co. and Texaco Inc, plan their CNG/Sabine Center to offer marketing services in the Northeast and Gulf Coast starting early this summer. Involved are Consolidated's CNG Transmission Corp. and Texaco's Sabine Pipe Line Co.
The center will aim to improve the ability of local gas utilities, interstate pipelines, large end users, marketers, and others in the mid-Atlantic and East Coast regions to buy, sell, transport, and park gas.
Last week's disclosure of CNG/Sabine's plans closely followed announcement of a proposal by Tenneco Gas, Questar Corp., and Entech Inc. for a western gas market center at a pipeline hub near Opal, Wyo. (OGJ, Mar. 7, p. 28).
Plans call for the CNG/Sabine Center to introduce a "superhub" concept by offering services at points along CNG Transmission's 7,400 mile pipeline system across six states.
Consolidated said the system is well suited for a market center because of its location close to major gas markets, ability to receive and dispatch gas at many points, and its numerous connections to interstate pipelines that serve major gas producing regions.
The CNG/Sabine Center initially will offer transfers, parking, wheeling, and a newly developed service designed to lighten the administrative load of buying and selling gas.
The goal of those and other services under development is to improve markets by minimizing transaction costs, increasing reliability, and giving buyers and sellers more options for trading, the CNG/Sabine combine said.
Potential customers will have the chance to try simulated hands-on transactions in the market center.
Sabine has experience in the field as operator of the Henry Hub, the major gas market center and supply aggregation point in Louisiana.
Since 1990, this hub has served as the standard delivery mechanism for natural gas traded on the futures market of the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Sabine also claims leadership in development of market center services such as intrahub transfers, a service introduced in 1991.
The company operates a gas pipeline system in Texas, Louisiana, and the Gulf of Mexico.
CNG Transmission operates an interstate pipeline with 6.2 bcf of peak day system capability, 4 bcfd of storage deliverability, and more than 250 bcf of working storage with facilities in six states-Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia, Virginia, and Maryland.
CNG Transmission connects with all major pipelines serving the U.S. Northeast. It also receives gas from many Appalachian producer interconnects and from Canada through the Iroquois Gas Transmission System and Niagara Import Point Project.
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