Guaymas-El Oro Pipeline

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The Guaymas-El Oro Pipeline is a natural gas pipeline running between Sonora and Sinaloa states, Mexico. Together with the adjoining Sásabe-Guaymas Gas Pipeline, it is also known as the Sonora pipeline or Gasoducto Sonora, Phase II. Service along the Guaymas-El Oro segment of the pipeline has been interrupted since 2017 due to disputes with local communities.

Location

The pipeline runs from Guaymas, Sonora to El Oro, Sinaloa, Mexico.

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Project Details

• Operator: IEnova
• Owner: IEnova (100%)
• Parent Company: Sempra Energy (100%)
• Current capacity: 5.3 billion cubic meters per year
• Length: 330 km
• Status: Idle
• Start Year: 2017
• Associated infrastructure:
  • Sásabe-Guaymas Gas Pipeline

Background

In October 2012, the Mexican division of Sempra International signed a 25-year contract with Mexico's Comisión Federal de Electricidad to build, own, and operate the Guaymas-El Oro project. The pipeline interconnects with the El Oro-Mazatlan Pipeline and is a key component of Mexico's north-northwest natural gas delivery network. Construction was completed in May 2017, and the pipeline operated commercially for three months before service was disrupted in August 2017.

Disruption of the Guaymas-El Oro pipeline has forced Mexico to rely more heavily on the El Encino-Topolobampo Gas Pipeline to supply natural gas to Sinaloa and other northwestern states.

Suspension of service and legal disputes

The pipeline was shut down in August 2017 following an act of sabotage by indigenous Yaqui groups who oppose its operation, and as of early 2022 it remained offline pending reconstruction of a missing 10-kilometer segment.

In 2015, the Yaqui tribe, with the exception of some members living in the Bácum community, approved a right-of-way easement agreement for the construction of the Guaymas-El Oro segment of the Sonora natural gas pipeline that crosses its territory. Representatives of the Bácum community filed a legal challenge in Mexican federal court demanding the right to withhold consent for the project and calling for stoppage of work within Yaqui territory. In 2016, the judge granted a suspension order that prohibited pipeline construction within the Bácum community territory. In 2017, an appellate court ruled that the scope of the 2016 suspension order encompassed the wider Yaqui territory, which has prevented Sempra Infrastructure from making repairs to put the pipeline back in service.

In July 2019, a federal district court ruled in favor of Sempra Infrastructure and held that the Yaqui tribe was properly consulted and that consent from the Yaqui tribe was properly received. Representatives of the Bácum community appealed this decision, causing the suspension order preventing repair work within Yaqui territory to remain in place until the appeals process is exhausted. In December 2021, the court of appeals referred the matter to Mexico’s Supreme Court.

In response to the suspension of service, Sempra Infrastructure has sought force majeure payments from Mexico's CFE (Federal Electricity Commission) and the two parties have been forced to repeatedly renegotiate terms of their contract to extend the pipeline's service start date. CFE has agreed to resume payments only when the damaged section of the Guaymas-El Oro segment of the Sonora pipeline is repaired. In the latter half of 2021, CFE was reportedly still in negotiations regarding reconstruction of the damaged pipeline segment, while Sempra Infrastructure continued to consider its right to terminate the contract and seek to recover costs and lost profits.

Potential resumption of service

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Conference with the President mentioning concerns with the Guaymas-El Oro Pipeline

In January 2022, Sempra Infrastructure and CFE signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the resumption of operations of the Guaymas El Oro pipeline in addition to the development of the Vista Pacífico LNG plant and the Vista Pacifico LNG Terminal. The MOU called for rerouting the Guaymas-El Oro pipeline in a manner favoring mutual understanding, dialogue and respect towards the Yaqui people. CFE will assume ownership and responsibility for constructing the new 70- to 90-kilometer segment of pipeline required to circumnavigate areas that the Yaqui consider sacred or ecologically critical. Sempra Infrastructure signaled its intention to enter into a definitive agreement with respect to the pipeline in the first quarter of 2022, while CFE announced plans to launch a tender for engineering, procurement and construction of the new pipeline segment.

As of March 2023, the US Energy Information Administration estimated that the Guaymas-El Oro pipeline would be brought back online by 2024. However, as of April 2024, there was no indication that the rerouted pipeline had been completed, and news sources continued to describe the project in the future tense.

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Interview with an environmental activist from the Yaqui tribe in Sonora - 2021

Technical description

The pipeline, operated by IEnova (Infraestructura Energética Nova SAB de CV), is 330 km (205 mi) long and 30 inches in diameter, with a capacity of 510 million cubic feet per day, or 5.3 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year.

Opposition

The Guaymas-El Oro project has generated opposition from an indigenous Yaqui group in Loma de Bácum, Sonora state, whose members say they never agreed to construction of a nine-mile section of pipeline that crosses their land. In an August 2017 protest, members of the community used a backhoe to remove a 25-foot section of the pipeline, disrupting operations and perpetuating an ongoing legal battle with IEnova. As of March 2018, the pipeline's status remained in limbo pending a decision by a Mexican federal district court.

President AMLO announced the creation of a justice commission for the restitution of land to the Yaqui people, June 2021 Source: Mongabay

In 2019, Mexico's federal electricity commission CFE agreed to work with IEnova to reopen the blocked section of pipeline, and in September 2019 the government announced that it was negotiating an agreement with the Yaqui community to reroute the pipeline south to steer clear of Loma de Bácum and other Yaqui-owned lands. In an August 2020 meeting with Yaqui leaders, Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador confirmed the government's support for rerouting the pipeline as a means of resolving the conflict.

In September 2021, the CFE officially announced it would build a section of the pipeline between 70-90 kilometers in length that keeps in mind the concerns of the Yaqui people notably avoiding sacred areas including hills and springs. However, the Yaqui people continued to express concerns about possible gas accidents, pollution of the Independence Aqueduct, deforestation, desertification, poverty, land rentals, and other forms of violence.

In April 2023, the Mexican government published a report describing the economic, environmental, social and cultural conflicts associated with the Guaymas-El Oro Pipeline, based on research conducted between November 2021 and May 2022.

In May 2023, residents of Loma de Bácum vowed to dismantle the pipeline again if the new route being developed by Sempra Energy crossed their territory, or if the Mexican government failed to comply with its promises to respect the rights of indigenous people.

As of June 2024, community opposition to the pipeline continued, prompting a meeting between the project's developers, federal officials and residents of Loma de Bácum.

Environmental, Health & Human Rights Impacts

Environmental Justice Atlas has documented a wide variety of negative pipeline-related impacts affecting the Yaqui people, including noise pollution, soil erosion, deforestation, and loss of vegetation cover, along with increased corruption, militarization, police presence, violence against women and other human rights violations.