Copano Senior Vice President Jim Wade said that, right now, “there is an overabundance of crude hauling trucks on the road.” The construction of the pipeline will allow some of those trucks to be removed from the road, because the crude oil and condensate will be flowing through the underground pipelines.

“It’s much safer to move this product under the ground,” he said.

The east-to-west portion of the pipeline will allow collection of condensate from well heads all along the pipeline path to flow to the Three Rivers facility before flowing south to Corpus Christi.

While there will still be some residual trucking going on, once the new pipeline is in place, truck traffic along SH 72 is expected to be reduced. At full operating capacity, the line will be able to move 100,000 barrels per day.

Wade said the pipeline is expected to be in limited service by late 2012, and will be fully operational during the second quarter of 2013.

While this is the first joint venture between Copano and Magellan, Copano is pleased with the choice.

Both companies brought existing facilities to the joint venture which will also allow the project to go into service quicker and with less new construction required. In addition, both companies are able to benefit and split the approximately $150 million price tag that comes with the project.

“What we have done is utilize existing infrastructure,” Wade said.

Copano already has the rights to much of the right of way needed to build the pipeline. The company had previously built a natural gas line along portions of the condensate route and at the same time acquired rights to install a second pipeline in the right of way. The company is therefore able to use the other part of their existing right of way for their condensate project.

According to the Copano press release, Magellan already owns the Corpus Christi shipping terminal and will be expanding the existing terminal to include 500,000 barrels of new dedicated condensate storage and a new dedicated dock delivery pipeline.