Pipeline leak forces shutdown of Canyon Express gas system

Ray Tyson

The Canyon Express pipeline, which serves three deepwater gas fields in the Gulf of Mexico, has been shut down because of a troublesome leak in the methanol delivery system that keeps hydrates from clogging sub-sea production wells.

Production from the King’s Peak, Aconcagua and Camden fields actually was halted in early December but not announced until Jan. 5.

“We really expected to find the leak without it having a material impact on production,” said Susan Spratlen, a vice president of Canyon Express user Pioneer Natural Resources.

The gas line is capable of handling 500 million cubic feet of gas per day, although combined field production was less than pipeline capacity when the line was shut down, Spratlen said.

Pioneer said the impact to its average daily production alone during the 2004 fourth quarter is expected to be about 5,000 barrels of oil equivalent, leaving total production for the quarter at the lower end of the company’s previously forecasted range of 190,000 to 205,000 barrels of equivalent per day.

Pioneer’s net share of production from Canyon Express averaged about 90 million cubic feet per day prior to the December shut in.

The leak in the pipeline that delivers methanol to the system, which parallels the 55-mile gas pipeline, was finally located on Jan. 1, Spratlen said. But she said it could take another month or two to fix the problem, depending on what repair option is selected.

France’s Total operates the Canyon Express gas system on behalf of fellow producers BP, Marathon Oil, Mariner Energy and Pioneer.

Spratlen said that while the exact cause of the leak was still being investigated, it is believed the methanol pipeline could have been struck by an object. “There is evidence something hit the line on the ocean floor,” she added.

A key technology employed at Canyon Express, among the deepest pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico, is said to be the recovery and reuse of methanol as a hydrate inhibitor. At water depths of 7,200 feet, temperatures below 400 degrees can cause hydrates to form at the wellhead. Canyon Express facilities include the storage, regeneration and distribution of 1,900 barrels per day of methanol.