A natural-gas compressor station. Photo by Penn State Live; published to Flickr under Creative Commons license.
The Sullivan County Democrat reports today that the Millenium Pipeline Company is seeking to build a natural-gas compressor station in the Delaware County town of Hancock.
The company owns and operates the Millenium Pipeline, which stretches across New York's Southern Tier and brings natural gas from the western part of the state to markets in metropolitan New York. The Millenium Pipeline runs through Hancock.
The compressor would allow the pipeline to carry more gas, the Democrat reports:
“My understanding is it’s on some land we already own,” explained Millennium spokesman Tom Collins last week.
According to the company’s website, Millennium hopes to build a “15,000-horsepower natural gas turbine-driven centrifugal compressor to increase pressure – and thereby throughput capacity – on the Millennium Pipeline.”
Also on Millenium's website: A few stats on the expected scale and impact of the project. The company states that the compressor station will cost about $12 million to build, employ 75-90 people during construction, and go online in November 2013.
The station will also generate noise, which the company states will stay below 55 dB (about the level of a noisy vacuum cleaner from 10 meters away), and air emissions. The company states:
As a minor emissions source, air quality will be minimally affected. The primary air emissions expected from this project are from the combustion of natural gas in the compressor turbine. The compressor will be equipped with "lean pre-mix" dry low nitrogen oxide (NOx) combustors to limit NOx. NOx emissions, as well as carbon monoxide (CO) and particulate matter (PM) emissions will be below required limits.
Millenium has set up a dedicated phone line for information about the project: 607-304-9029.
The Democrat reports that the project has yet to apply for project approval to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which is likely to happen in the fall.
Below: A map of the proposed site for the Hancock compressor station, near Hungry Hill Road. Source: milleniumpipeline.com.
