Atlantic Coast Pipeline LLC, which has proposed a 600-mile, 1.5-bcfd natural gas transmission pipeline to bring Marcellus-Utica shale gas to Virginia and North Carolina, has signed a construction contract with Spring Ridge Constructors LLC, a joint venture of pipeline construction companies Price Gregory International Inc., a Quanta Services Inc. company; US Pipeline Inc.; SMPC LLC; and Rockford Corp., a Primoris Services Corp. company.
Pending approval by the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) would extend from Harrison County, W.Va., southeast through Virginia with a lateral extension to Chesapeake, Va., and then south through eastern North Carolina to Robeson County. If approved, construction is scheduled to begin in fall 2017.
FERC in early August issued a notice of schedule, which established the timeline for the remainder of the project's federal environmental review process. Based on FERC's schedule, ACP expects to receive a FERC certificate in late summer or fall 2017, with construction beginning shortly thereafter. ACP anticipates completing construction and bringing the pipeline into service in late 2019. ACP says it is working with its contractors to evaluate the possibility of bringing on more crews and working on more simultaneous spreads in order to complete construction sooner and expects to finalize this analysis over the next few months.
Atlantic Coast Pipeline LLC consists of four US energy companies: Dominion, Duke Energy, Piedmont Natural Gas Co. Inc., and Southern Co. Gas. The joint venture partners expect the pipeline to cost $4.5-5 billion.