PORTLAND, Maine — Summit Natural Gas of Maine has withdrawn a rate request and agreed to excavate and test pipeline joints that utility regulators found may have been improperly fused during the company’s multimillion-dollar expansion last year.
The plan approved by regulators late last month calls for the company to excavate, inspect and test all of the pipeline connections completed by three contractors during Summit’s expansion projects in the Kennebec Valley as well as Yarmouth, Cumberland and Falmouth in 2014.
The plan, which calls for Summit to complete the new inspection work by Dec. 31, also requires the company to perform regular surveys to check for gas leaks and provide regulators a contingency plan in case it can’t complete the work on time.
“As a contingency for this eventuality, [Summit] shall also propose a plan to provide customers impacted by a shutdown or cessation of the operating status of the system with alternative fuel sources, at no incremental cost to such customers,” the company’s plan states.
Summit is required to give that plan to regulators by Thursday.
The exact locations of the electrofusion tee couplings in question were not revealed in the case before the Maine Public Utilities Commission, which in June classified the locations as confidential infrastructure information.
Theresa Gilbert, a spokeswoman for the company, wrote in an email response that the excavation primarily involves its system in the Kennebec Valley and the company has already gotten in touch with town officials.
“We’ll work to avoid any potential interruption to service, but if that becomes necessary, we’ll communicate with our customers about the impact on them, and work to keep the duration as short as possible,” Gilbert wrote.
Summit in August announced it was scaling back expansion plans in Falmouth, Cumberland and Yarmouth. Bill Shane, Cumberland’s town manager, told The Forecaster that the sharp drop in oil prices chipped into the business case for converting to natural gas.
Gilbert wrote that the agreement to re-inspect certain gas lines did not affect the timeline of Summit’s buildout.
“The company’s plan was always to adjust the construction plan to align with areas of greatest customer demand, and those decisions were made independently of the mitigation plan,” Gilbert wrote.
The company told regulators Tuesday that its ongoing work prompted it to withdraw a controversial rate request, in which it sought to factor certain advertising expenses and administrative costs into its rates.
The Office of the Public Advocate, which participates in PUC cases on behalf of ratepayers, opposed part of that request, saying the company should not be allowed to recover costs for early advertising or “educational marketing” in a service area in its rates.
“Summit’s efforts to improve its image through the promotional and institutional advertising may very well be laudable and necessary from the perspective of Summit and its shareholders, but these are clearly the kind of expenditures that are institutional and promotional in nature,” wrote utility consultant David Brevitz in July, in testimony submitted on behalf of the public advocate’s office.
Summit attorney Katie Gray wrote Tuesday to regulators that the company wants permission to refile a similar rate change application after completing its inspection and replacement program for the pipeline connections.
In the meantime, Gray wrote the company “is currently focusing all of its resources on fulfilling its commitments to customers and meeting the expectations of the commission’s gas safety staff in compliance with the [inspection plan], to the exclusion of other activities.”