Southcross Energy, Dallas, has started construction of a fractionator and NGL and residue-pipeline outlets in South Texas to expand service to producers in the liquids-rich Eagle Ford shale where NGL infrastructure has been constrained.
When elements of the project are operating in July, Southcross will have 335 MMcfd of gas processing capacity and 16,300 b/d of fractionation capacity in the area, the company said.
Southcross is installing its Bonnie View fractionator in Refugio County, 26 miles northeast of Corpus Christi near the company’s previously announced 200-MMcfd Woodsboro gas processing plant, which is under construction (OGJ Online, June 14, 2011), and its existing 135-MMcfd Gregory gas processing plant and fractionator. The Bonnie View fractionator will have initial capacity of 11,500 b/d of NGLs, which could be expanded to 15,000 b/d, said the company.
As announced last year, Southcross enhanced its Gregory gas plant 13 miles east of Corpus Christi in San Patricio County to 135 MMcfd (OGJ, June 28, 2010, Newsletter). This resulted in increased plant liquids-extraction capacity and full utilization of the plant’s 4,800-b/d fractionator.
Southcross also is building pipelines that will interconnect the Woodsboro, Gregory, and Bonnie View plants, as well as NGL and residue gas outlets. When all planned construction is completed, said the company, Southcross will be able to coordinate transportation of natural gas and NGLs between the Woodsboro and Gregory plants and to market residue gas, NGL products, and y-grade NGLs.
Southcross’s pipeline connectivity from the Woodsboro and Gregory plants will allow producers access to several major interstate and intrastate residue-gas pipeline outlets, said the announcement, as well as to the company’s traditional Corpus Christi ship channel industrial market. The “backbone” of Southcross’s residue-gas header system, it said, is the former Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. 5A system. Southcross acquired this pipeline last year.