Urucu-Manaus Gas Pipeline

• [español]

Urucu-Manaus Gas Pipeline , also known as the Urucu-Coari-Manaus Pipeline, or Gasoduto Urucu-Coari-Manaus in Portuguese, is an operating natural gas pipeline.

Location

The pipeline runs from Petrobras's Pólo Arara production facility in the Urucu oil province to seven gas-fired power plants in Manaus, Brazil. En route, the pipeline passes through the municipalities of Coari, Codajás, Anori, Anamã, Caapiranga, Mancapuru, and Iranduba in Brazil's Amazonas state.

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Project Details

• Operator: TAG (Transportadora Associada de Gás S.A.)
• Parent Company: Engie (65%), CDPQ (Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec) (35%)
• Capacity: 5.5 to 6.7 MMm³/d
• Length: 412 miles / 663.2 km
• Diameter: 18 inches, 20 inches
• Status: Operating
• Start Year: 2009

Background

The Urucu-Manaus Gas Pipeline transports natural gas from Urucu, Brazil's largest onshore natural gas reserve, to Manaus, the largest city in Brazil's Amazon basin. The pipeline was inaugurated on 26 November 2009, and was originally operated by Transportadora Urucu-Manaus S.A., a subsidiary of Petrobras. The pipeline supplies the cities of Coari, Codajás, Anori, Anamã, Caapiranga, Manacapuru, Iranduba, and Manaus, as well as the power plants at Manauara, Tambaqui, Jaraqui, Aparecida, Mauá, Cristiano Rocha, and Ponta Negra-Urucu-Coari-Manaus, which collectively generate 760 MW of electricity.

As of 2015, the Brazilian news outlet Globo reported that 30% of the natural gas transported by the Urucu-Manaus pipeline was going unused due to inadequate distribution systems and under-utilization at gas-fired power plants in the Manaus area. According to the report, contractual obligations would require the Amazonas state government to pay fines to Petrobras if natural gas from the pipeline is not used at full capacity by 2017.

In August 2010, Transportadora Urucu-Manaus S.A. was incorporated into TAG (Transportadora Associada de Gás S.A.). In April 2019, a consortium led by French energy giant Engie announced that it would purchase 90% of TAG's transport infrastructure, including the Urucu-Manaus gas pipeline, from Petrobras. The sale to Engie received final approval from Petrobras in June 2019.

Financial Irregularities

According to a March 2019 review by the National Electric Energy Agency (ANEEL) Amazonas Energia bought more fuel than recommended from the pipeline and paid more than for gas from other retail outlets.

Sections

The pipeline consists of three sections. For the first 279-kilometer section, an 18-inch liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) pipeline from the production facility in Urucu to Coari was switched to carrying natural gas, while parallel to this a new 10-inch LPG pipeline was constructed. The second section (196 km) runs from Coari to Anamã, and the third (186 km) continues from Anamã to Manaus. In addition to the main trunkline, the pipeline has seven branches.

Technical features

In the first stage of its operation, the pipeline transported 17 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas per year. The total capacity of the pipeline is 20 bcm of natural gas per year.

Proposed Urucu to Juruá Expansion

A 140 km westward expansion of the pipeline has been proposed, from Urucu to the Araracanga natural gas fields in Juruá, where four test wells have shown the potential to produce 500,000 cm/d of natural gas each. Petrobras was granted environmental permits to build the Urucu-Juruá pipeline in 2008 and again in 2011, but the project languished.

In December 2020, Eneva acquired the rights to develop the Juruá oil and gas field, after Petrobras relinquished its own claim. However, Eneva initially appeared to be prioritizing river transport over pipelines as a means of moving gas from the Jurua field to Manaus. As of July 2023, Eneva's website made no mention of a pipeline extension from Urucu to Juruá, and in the absence of further news, the project was presumed to be cancelled.

Urucu to Juruá Expansion Location

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Urucu-Juruá Expansion Project Details

• Owner:
• Parent company:
• Capacity: 2 MMm³/d
• Length: 140 km / 87 miles
• Diameter:
• Status: Cancelled
• Start Year:

Proposed Urucu to Porto Velho Expansion

Proposals to bring natural gas to the state of Rondônia in Brazil's upper Amazon Basin date back at least two decades but have repeatedly encountered obstacles. In March 2001, an environmental impact report was issued for a 522.2-kilometer gas pipeline designed to stretch from Urucu to Porto Velho. In August 2002, Brazil's environmental agency Ibama granted a permit for construction of the Urucu-Porto Velho pipeline, but the ensuing legal tug-of-war between proponents and opponents kept the project stalled, with environmentalists warning of the potential for soil and water pollution, deforestation, unchecked development and negative impacts on indigenous communities along the pipeline's path.

Ibama issued a new construction permit for the pipeline in 2007, and in 2008 Brazil's federal government expressed its renewed commitment to seeing the pipeline built. However, by 2012 the project had again been abandoned, with Brazilian president Dilma Roussef asserting that gas production in Urucu was insufficient to supply both Manaus and Porto Velho.

Despite these repeated setbacks, Rondônia's elected officials, including Senators Valdir Raupp, Governor Marcos Rocha, and Senator Marcos Rogério have continued to lobby for the pipeline, citing natural gas as a cheaper, cleaner alternative to the diesel fuel used to generate electricity at the state's aging Rio Madeira and Termo Norte II power plants.

In August 2019, Rondônia's state legislative delegation, accompanied by officials from the Rondônian gas distribution company Rongás, met in Brasilia with Petrobras president Roberto Castelo Branco to advocate for an extension of the Urucu-Manaus Pipeline 523 km south from Urucu to Rondônia's capital, Porto Velho. Government officials noted that there is strong demand in Rondônia for natural gas as a low-cost fuel alternative, that the section of pipeline between Urucu and Porto Velho would be shorter and easier to construct than the existing Urucu-Manaus section, and that private investors are actively interested in building the pipeline, which would leave Petrobras free to sell its gas in Rondônia without undertaking major new infrastructure investments of its own.

Since 2020, the proposed Urucu-Porto Velho extension has continued to receive periodic mentions in the press, and Brazil's law 14182, passed in July 2021, which calls for the construction of 8 GW of new gas power plants and associated pipelines serving Brazil's interior, has prompted speculation that the Urucu-Porto Velho project might be revived. However, as of July 2023 there have been no significant developments in more than two years, and the project is presumed to be shelved.

Urucu to Porto Velho Expansion Location

The proposed expansion would run south-southeast from Urucu to Rondônia's capital city of Porto Velho, passing through the communities of Coari, Tapauá and Canutama in Amazonas state and crossing the Madeira, Açuã, Purus, Coari and Itanhauã Rivers.

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Urucu-Porto Velho Expansion Project Details

• Owner:
• Parent company:
• Capacity: 2 MMm³/d
• Length: 523 km / 325 miles
• Diameter: 14 inches
• Status: Shelved
• Start Year:

Articles and resources

External articles

Wikipedia also has an article on Urucu-Manaus Gas Pipeline (Urucu-Manaus pipeline). This article may use content from the Wikipedia article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License].