Ramal Tula Gas Pipeline

This article is part of the Global Fossil Infrastructure Tracker, a project of Global Energy Monitor.

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Ramal Tula Gas Pipeline is a partially constructed natural gas pipeline in Mexico. The project's original owner, ATCO, halted construction on the pipeline in 2015. However, prospects for its completion were revived when the Mexican government acquired the project in 2023.

Location

The pipeline was to run from from the Cempoala-Santa Ana system to the Tula generation plant in the state of Hidalgo.

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Project Details

• Operator: Comisión Federal de Electricidad
• Parent Company: Comisión Federal de Electricidad
• Proposed capacity: 505 million cubic feet per day
• Length: 10 mi / 17 km
• Status: Shelved
• Start Year:

Background

The pipeline was originally owned by ATCO and operated by its subsidiary ATCO Mexico.

In December 2015 a court ordered ATCO to halt construction of the pipeline because it had failed to properly obtain permits from affected landowners whose property would be traversed. As of December 2017, the project was still caught up in legal challenges, with two kilometers of the 17 km pipeline remaining to be constructed.

In 2018, the incoming administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador cancelled ATCO's contract for the pipeline on the grounds that the project had not been finished. ATCO in turn argued before the London Court of International Arbitration that the Mexican government had not taken sufficient measures to allow completion of the pipeline. The court agreed, and Mexico was forced to pay ATCO $100 million in damages, interest and legal fees in 2021. In April 2023 ATCO agreed to transfer ownership of the pipeline to the Mexican government. The decision freed ATCO of further responsibility for the pipeline while offering the government the opportunity to finish the project.