Construction to begin on natural gas pipeline to Murray County this fall

Published 10:16 pm Sunday, March 13, 2016

A natural gas pipeline that will extend from Coweta County to southern Murray County could begin construction this fall, according to a spokesman for the company that owns the pipeline.

The pipeline was announced in 2014, but the company recently proposed some changes to the route as it goes through Bartow and Paulding counties.

“We are pretty much following an existing power line the whole way,” said Chris Stockton, a spokesman for Williams, an energy company based in Tulsa, Okla. “But the powerline runs near a creek in that area, and FERC (the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) asked us to make some changes.”

Stockton says FERC is expected to issue an environmental assessment of the changed route by March 31 and a final order to proceed in late June or early July. If that happens, construction will begin in the fall and is expected to take about a year.

The pipeline will serve natural gas-powered electricity plants along its route, including Oglethorpe Power’s Thomas A. Smith Energy Facility in Murray County.