WSPC03460

• File Number: 8272
• Description: Colorado River - Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Program - CRBSCP
• State: CO
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Water Division: 5
• Date: 1/1/1998
• Author: DOI-BOR
• Title: Trans-Colorado Gas Transmission Project - Colorado-New Mexico - Supplement to Final EIS
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

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SUMMARY

The TransColorado Gas Transmission Company (TransColorado) plans to construct, operate, and ultimately
abandon a 272-mile natural gas pipeline, the TransColorado Gas Transmission Project. The TransColorado
Gas Transmission Company is made up of K N Energy, WITh headquarters in Lakewood, Colorado, and
Questar Pipeline Company, with headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah. TransColorado proposes to begin
pipeline construction in June 1998,

The completed project would extend from the Piceance Basin near Meeker, Colorado to an interconnection
WITh a previously constructed 22.5-mile pipeline segment (called TransColorado Phase I) that terminates at
a major interstate pipeline junction near Bloomfield, New Mexico. The project consists of a buried 22- to
24-inch natural gas pipeline to be constructed wIThin an already-granted 50-foot-wide Right of Way (ROW)
and 25-foot-wide Temporary Use Area (TUA) paralleling the ROW. The 75-foot-wide construction ROW is
comprised of this ROWand TUA.

The pipeline system and associated facilities (compressor stations, block valves, metering, maintenance and
communication equipment) were evaluated in an Environmental Impact Statement prepared under the
direction of the lead Agency, Bureau of Land Management (BlM) , and the Cooperating Agency, U.S. Forest
Service (USFS). The Agency Preferred pipeline route in the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS)
issued in July of 1992 was approved by separate BlM and USFS Records of Decision (RODs) in December
of 1992, The appropriate USFS land management plans were amended to include the utilITY corridors, The
BlM issued the Right of Way grant (COC51280) concurrently WITh the RODs for all federal lands, The
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued ITS Certificate of Public Convenience and NeceSSITY
for the project on June 3, 1994 (FERC 1994),

REASON FOR PREPARING THE SUPPLEMENT

The BlM and Forest Service have re-examined the 1992 FEIS and RODs, determined that the document is
still adequate in its analysis of environmental impacts of the approved pipeline route and associated
compressor stations, and that no significant new environmental condITions or information are present that
warrant a re-analysis of the fundamental decision to approve the pipeline that was recorded in legal
commitments to TransColorado in the ROW Grant. The agencies have concluded that preparation of a
Supplement to the 1992 FEIS (Supplement) is an appropriate process to meet the agencies' review
responsibilities for a project that has recently been analyzed under the National Environmental Policy Act
(NEPA) and for which minor project changes and new information have been identified.

As part of the decisions recorded in the 1992 RODs, further environmental analysis of TUAs was anticipated.
The Supplement to the 1992 EIS addresses those TUAs. In addITion. selected aspects of the 1992 decision
have been re-examined in response to new information and changed circumstances.

The Supplement to the FEIS is limited in scope and is focused on issues, information, and analysis
necessary to make five specific authorization decisions.