Canadian Joint Venture Receives Major Permits for Natural Gas Storage Facility

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)-- Landis Energy Corporation (TSX:LIS) (Calgary, Alberta) and Fort Chicago Energy Partners (TSX:FCE-UN) (Calgary) have received most of the necessary permits for a proposed joint venture Alton Natural Gas Storage L.P. to be located near Truro, Nova Scotia.

Alton Natural Gas has received an underground hydrocarbon storage-area license from Nova Scotia's government. The company has also recently reached an agreement with Nova Scotia's Environment and Labour Department. The agreement allows the company to apply for the necessary industrial permit in two phases. The two-phase permitting has allowed Alton to remove trees over the water pipeline route and cavern facility site. This was necessary to meet environmental approval conditions and remain on track with the project schedule. The clearing of the right-of-way was necessary before bird-nesting season, which began in May. The company has now applied for a hydrocarbon storage-area lease from Nova Scotia's government. The lease is necessary to proceed with the construction and operation of the storage facility.

Alton is concurrently completing the detailed engineering and pre-construction surveying with the assistance of SolTech Projects Incorporated (Calgary, Alberta). SolTech will also oversee the preparation and reviewing the request for quotations and bid document packages, which should go out in the third quarter of 2008. The timing of construction commencement is dependent on the approval of the remaining permits. Preliminary estimates are that leaching of the four 1.5 billion cubic feet salt dome caverns will begin in the second half of 2008 and continue through the end of 2010. The 10 kilometers of either single 24-inch-diameter or dual 12-inch-diameter pipeline and the 5,000-horsepower compressor station will begin in the spring or summer of 2009, and the completion will coincide with the completion of the cavern solution-mining in late 2010. Alton and SolTech are evaluating various compressor unit setups and arrangements to identify the best configuration suited for the caverns.

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