Long before the Dakota Access Pipeline became a household name, much of its infrastructure carried a different fuel in a different direction. Kelcy Warren, trained as a civil engineer at the University of Texas at Arlington, has overseen roughly a dozen major pipeline repurposing projects at Energy Transfer, and the Dakota system is among the most complex examples of the practice.
From Gas Line to Crude Corridor
The Trunkline pipeline, originally built to move natural gas from the Gulf Coast north to Chicago, was converted to carry crude oil south instead. Energy Transfer connected roughly 675 miles of that converted line to the 1,170 mile Dakota Access Pipeline, creating what is now called the Bakken Pipeline system with capacity for up to 750,000 barrels a day. Kelcy Warren has pointed to the project as proof that the company’s approach, asking what the best use of a given pipe is rather than defaulting to how it was originally built, pays off. North Dakota’s Bakken shale, the second largest oil field in the country at the time, had been relying on trucks and rail before the pipeline gave producers a cheaper option.
A Project That Drew Scrutiny
The construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline, which runs from the Bakken and Three Forks production area in North Dakota to Illinois, drew public controversy during the build. Warren has not shied away from discussing the project’s difficulty, framing it as part of the ordinary friction that comes with large infrastructure work. He has said the company learns as much from setbacks as from successes, a philosophy he traces back to conversations with shale industry pioneers who stumbled into some of their biggest breakthroughs. The finished pipeline now moves large volumes of crude that once traveled by truck and rail, cutting congestion on highways near the Bakken while giving Energy Transfer another example of turning existing steel in the ground into a new revenue stream. See related link for more information.
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