October 31, 2008 Leaf River Energy Center LLC Receives FERC’s Certificate of Necessity for Natural Gas Storage Facility

Westport CT/ October 31, 2008 / Leaf River Energy Center LLC (Leaf River), a wholly owned subsidiary of Westport, CT based NGS Energy LP announced today the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity authorizing Leaf River to develop and operate a salt dome natural gas storage facility and the associated pipeline infrastructure.

 Leaf River is expecting to file for Authorization to Commence Construction with the FERC next week and start building the facility immediately after that authorization is granted.

 The storage facility will consist of caverns that will be created in two salt domes situated on over 400 acres in Smith and Jasper Counties, Mississippi and when completed, will provide up to 32 Bcf of working gas capacity. The 43 mile pipeline header system associated with the facility will stretch between Smith, Jasper and Clarke counties in Mississippi and interconnect with Southern Natural, Gulf South, Transco, Tennessee, Destin and the proposed Kinder Morgan Express Pipelines.

 This highly deliverable and flexible storage facility will be able to inject up to 1 Bcf/d and withdraw up to 2.5 Bcf/d across the facility and is expected to be in service by the summer of 2010.

 “We are very excited to receive this order and enter the next phase of development of this necessary and well positioned gas storage facility,” said Laura Luce, President of Leaf River Energy Center. 

 “The amount of interest and contracted capacity for this project has really demonstrated the market’s desire for a natural gas storage facility that can take or place gas in high volumes to multiple pipelines in an economical manner.

 “Also, like our last project that was brought in operation on time and on budget, the Leaf River Energy Center will provide hundreds of construction jobs and high paying operating positions that will benefit the local area,” she continued.

 Besides the multiple turn firm and interruptible storage services, Leaf River will provide park and loan and hourly balancing services and interruptible wheeling services at market based rates.

 NGS Energy LP has assembled a portfolio of highly flexible gas storage assets throughout North America. Their newly operational Tres Palacios Gas Storage facility in Matagorda County, Texas just received FERC authorization to operate the entire facility including all interconnects. Other projects in various stages of development are located in Colorado and Louisiana.

Parties interested in contracting for storage capacity or learning more about the Leaf River Energy Center are encouraged to contact Mark McConnell at 203-557-1000 or mmcconnell@ngsenergy.com.