Operator to boost Western gas pipeline

Salt Lake City-based Kern River Transmission Co. plans to boost the capacity of a pair of 36-inch pipelines that collect the gas in Opal, Wyo., and travel as far as California's San Joaquin Valley. At one spot in central Utah, the parallel pipelines merge into one because of mountainous terrain. Kern River says it plans to complete a second pipeline there to boost capacity by 266 million cubic feet a day. The pipelines have been in service since 1992. Doubling the pipeline in central Utah and increasing the compression pressures will allow more than 2.1 billion cubic feet of natural gas a day to travel through the pipelines to meet growing demand, up from 1.76 billion cubic feet.The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has decided the pipeline expansion can be accomplished with little environmental damage. FERC will take public comment until May 17, then issue a final environmental impact study this summer.

Kern River has pledged to avoid disturbing stream flows when it buries the second pipeline through a 28-mile section of central Utah. The Deseret News