El Paso Natural Gas (EPNG), owned by Kinder Morgan, has entered into a 25-year transportation precedent agreement in connection with plans to build a new pipeline to serve customers in Mexico. Terms call for EPNG, acting through its affiliate Sasabe Pipeline Company, to initially provide approximately 200 mcf/day (about 2.1 bcm/year) of firm transportation capacity via a new pipeline that would extend from EPNG’s existing south mainlines, near Tucson, Arizona, to the U.S.-Mexico border, terminating at Sasabe, Arizona. The proposed Sasabe Pipeline would interconnect via a new international border crossing with a 36 inch (91 cm) diameter natural gas pipeline to be built in Mexico. Subject to regulatory approvals, construction of the Sasabe Lateral would begin in the first quarter of 2014, with anticipated in-service in September 2014.
In May 2012, the Mexican Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE) issued an international public invitation for companies to bid on constructing a new natural gas pipeline from the U.S.-Mexico border near Sasabe to Guaymas, Sonora, to supply existing fuel-oil-fired power generation plants that will be converted to natural gas, along with other new natural gas fired power generation plants that will be built during the next 15 years. Sempra's Mexican business unit has been awarded two contracts by CFE to construct, own and operate an approximately 820 km, US$1bn pipeline network connecting the Northwestern states of Sonora and Sinaloa. The Sasabe Pipeline would interconnect with this recently awarded pipeline network.