NGPL Amarillo Expansion Adds 550,000 Dth/d to Power Texas Panhandle Data Center Growth
Natural Gas Pipeline Company of America LLC (NGPL), a Kinder Morgan subsidiary, is advancing its Amarillo Expansion Project to add up to 550,000 dekatherms per day of firm transportation capacity along its Amarillo System in the Texas Panhandle, according to Kinder Morgan’s own project disclosures.
Market Impact
The expansion, estimated at $200 million (with Kinder Morgan’s share approximately $75 million), is designed to support growing regional demand, including additional data center development in the area. All of the project’s capacity is fully subscribed under a long-term contract, Kinder Morgan said in its second-quarter 2026 earnings release. NGPL ran a binding open season in July 2026 to solicit any additional shipper commitments beyond the pre-arranged capacity, targeting a new delivery interconnect in Deaf Smith County, Texas, with receipt points spanning the Texas Panhandle, western Oklahoma, and Nebraska. NGPL filed its FERC application for the project in September 2026, and Kinder Morgan expects the expansion to enter service in the third quarter of 2028, pending regulatory approvals.
The Deaf Smith County corridor is also where Google, through its Intersect Power subsidiary and contractor Blattner, is developing the “Project Roman” data center campus, a project expected to bring roughly 2,500 construction jobs and about 90 permanent operations jobs to the Hereford, Texas area, per local reporting and county officials. The data center is expected to be paired with its own natural gas-fired generation and renewable power sources, driving the kind of regional gas demand growth NGPL cites as the rationale for the Amarillo Expansion.
What It Means for Subcontractors
- NGPL’s $200 million expansion means pipeline construction, compressor station work, and related civil packages in the Texas Panhandle corridor between the Panhandle/Oklahoma receipt points and the new Deaf Smith County delivery point.
- The FERC application is now filed; subcontractors should track the docket for the environmental review and certificate timeline, since construction can’t proceed until the certificate is granted.
- Separately, the Google/Intersect Power/Blattner data center project near Hereford is already in its permitting and community engagement phase, with construction targeted for completion before 2030 — a parallel, multi-year build with its own civil, electrical, and mechanical subcontract packages.
- Firms with compressor station, pipeline construction, or high-voltage electrical experience in the Panhandle region should be building relationships with both NGPL/Kinder Morgan and the Intersect Power/Blattner team now, well ahead of any bid releases.
- With a Q3 2028 in-service target for the pipeline expansion, this is a multi-year runway, not an immediate hiring event — confirm bid package timing directly with Kinder Morgan or its EPC contractors as the project matures.
