Washington, 27 July (Argus) — Pipeline operator TransCanada plans to begin constructing its 700,000 b/d Gulf Coast Pipeline Project in the coming weeks, after receiving a final permit from the US Army Corps of Engineers.
The go-head from the Army Corps office in Fort Worth, Texas, was the last of three permits needed from the agency to begin building the pipeline from the Cushing, Oklahoma, oil storage hub to Texas Gulf coast refineries. The Army Corps reviews projects that cross federal waters and wetlands.
“TransCanada is now in a position to start construction of the oil pipeline in the coming weeks,” the company said.
The company has said that the Gulf pipeline could go into service in late 2013.
The pipeline was once a part of TransCanada's Keystone XL crude pipeline project, which in its current proposed form would send crude from the Alberta oil sands down to Steele City, Nebraska. TransCanada separated the projects early this year after President Barack Obama in January rejected the company's application for a cross-border permit.
In March, Obama pledged to cut through red tape in the regulatory review of the Gulf coast line, acknowledging the need to relieve a midcontinent crude glut at Cushing.
TransCanada re-applied for Keystone XL's presidential permit in May, and a decision on that project is expected in the first quarter of 2013.
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