Kinder Morgan restores natural gas flows to Mexico after pipeline repairs

Kinder Morgan has restored natural gas shipments to Mexico via its Tennessee Gas Pipeline following repairs to sections of the system. The company had previously declared force majeure after identifying issues on October 5 that required the isolation of certain segments, including the Rio Bravo and Cenagas delivery meters.

The brief outage highlighted Mexico’s significant energy dependency on the United States. Approximately 75% of Mexico’s natural gas is sourced from Texas, and U.S. pipeline exports to Mexico have increased from roughly 1 billion cubic feet per day in 2010 to approximately 8 billion cubic feet per day currently.

Cuitláhuac García, director of the Mexican pipeline operator CENAGAS, noted that the country maintains only about three days of gas reserves due to a lack of large-scale storage facilities. While the outage prompted warnings that flows could drop by as much as 20%, García stated that a gas crisis has been avoided as Pemex has increased domestic production to alleviate concerns.