The Atlantic Sunrise Project is a proposed pipeline infrastructure project that would increase Pennsylvania’s impact on domestic need for Natural Gas Liquids (NGL). The pipeline will expand upon existing pipeline infrastructure to connect Natural Gas liquids (NGL) from the Marcellus Shale plays in northeastern Pennsylvania to markets and communities along the East Coast. This expansion would add approximately 1.7 million dekatherms each day of pipeline capacity to the Transco system, and would increase economic activity across project regions.
Looking at how the connectivity of NGL resources continues to buckle under the lack of pipeline capacity between the reserves, Atlantic Sunrise represents an important shift towards a more interconnected and better powered Pennsylvania. According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), the Marcellus Natural Gas Shale plays host one of the largest stores of natural gas in the country. Wood Mackenzie further posits that the Marcellus and Utica Shale plays stand to lead the future of U.S. gas supply, “driven by the construction of additional pipe”.
Rory Miller, Senior Vice President of Williams Partners’ Atlantic-Gulf, underscored the “collaborative efforts to design the Atlantic Sunrise Project in a manner that minimizes environmental impacts, while fulfilling the critical need of connecting customers along the East Coast with abundant, cost-effective Pennsylvania natural gas.”
Put simply, the Atlantic Sunrise Project was designed to capitalize on this potential and to connect millions of American homes with the natural gas needed to meet daily needs through a safe and efficient network. With recent productions and developments at the Marcellus and Utica Shale, the sheer abundance of U.S. NGL supply signifies serious and steady economic growth across Pennsylvania and the rest of the country.
Linked industry expansion and estimated revenues from the project drive its multifaceted local and national impacts. So doing, the Atlantic Sunrise project stands to make an interconnected Pennsylvania less of a pipedream, and more of a reality.