The deal will offer Williams access to natural gas liquids-rich portion of the Marcellus Shale in North America.
Caiman Energy is an independent gathering and processing business located in northern West Virginia, southwestern Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio.
Caiman’s existing physical assets include a gathering system, two processing facilities and a fractionator in northern West Virginia which are currently under expansion including a future ethane pipeline.
The acquisition also includes long-term acreage and processing commitments including 236,000 dedicated gathering acres from 10 producers in West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Williams Partners expects significant growth in gathering volumes and NGL production from these assets with an estimated 300 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in place within a 35-mile radius of the system.
The partnership expects the Caiman system to gather more than 2 billion cubic feet per day and produce about 300,000 barrels per day of NGLs and condensate by 2020.
Williams Partners will also launch a new joint venture with Caiman Energy and its investors to develop midstream infrastructure in the oil-rich prospects of the Utica Shale, primarily in Ohio and northwest Pennsylvania.
The acquisition is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2012.
