Pony Express Pipeline Launches Open Season for Transportation Services

By Brad Kramer April 1, 2021 View Profile

Tallgrass Pony Express Pipeline LLC announced on March 31 a binding open season to solicit shipper commitments for crude oil transportation.

Pony Express is a subsidiary of Tallgrass Energy LP. The company is seeking commitments for crude oil transportation from Pony Express’ Guernsey, Platteville and Buckingham origins to destinations in Cushing, Oklahoma, in exchange for volume incentive tariff rates.

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Prospective shippers may review details of the open season after executing a confidentiality agreement obtained by contacting Matt Hester at matt.hester@tallgrassenergylp.com.

The approximately 830-mile Pony Express (PXP) crude oil pipeline originates in Guernsey, Wyoming, and runs through Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas, connecting with three refineries before terminating in Cushing. Cushing is North America’s crude oil hub and a key trading and pricing point for NYMEX WTI. PXP sources oil from the Bakken, Denver Julesburg and Powder River plays, delivering five distinct common streams for our customers – Bakken Light Sweet, Mixed Sweet, Niobrara, Pony Express Light and Central Kansas Uplift – to the Cushing oil hub for distribution to markets across the country. Placed in service in 2014, Pony Express has the capacity to transport about 400,000 barrels a day (bpd).

Answering producers’ call for more pipeline capacity out of the Bakken, Tallgrass built PXP and signed joint tariff agreements with two other pipelines to seamlessly deliver Bakken crude to Cushing and points in between.

To meet the transportation needs of producers in both the Bakken and Rockies regions, Tallgrass converted a 430-mile natural gas pipeline and built another 260 miles of pipeline to extend PXP through southern Kansas into Oklahoma. The 70-mile Northeast Colorado Lateral (NECL) adds optionality for producers in the Niobrara Shale in Northeastern Colorado and Southeastern Wyoming, intersecting Pony Express east of Sterling, Colo. Before terminating in Cushing, PXP connects to Holly Frontier’s and CHS McPherson’s refining complexes in Kansas and to Phillips 66’s Ponca City, Oklahoma, refinery.