(The Center Square) – Louisiana regulators Tuesday launched a 25-day public comment period to retroactively authorize repairs on the severely damaged Delfin Offshore Pipeline, which underwent an emergency replacement of a 105-foot section in Cameron Parish after a violent blowout in February.
The Louisiana Department of Conservation and Energy’s Office of Permitting and Compliance published a formal notice on a Coastal Use Permit application submitted by Delfin seeking retroactive “After the Fact” authorization for extensive repairs the company made to the natural gas pipeline.
Houston-based Delfin has completed work on the damaged section of the 42-inch-diameter pipeline. The explosion left a 50-foot-by-80-foot blast crater, a severely burned contractor and a gas leak that released an estimated 56 million cubic feet of natural gas.
The Sierra Club and Louisiana environmental and fishing rights group For a Better Bayou protested federal regulatory approvals of the Delfin liquefied natural gas project in March 2025, arguing that fast-tracked permitting of the retrofitted, nearly 50-year-old pipeline created severe safety risks.
The pipeline had been idle since 2012, and the blowout occurred while crews were conducting routine cleaning and structural testing before Delfin begins operations at the company’s LNG export terminal now under construction in offshore federal waters about 40 miles off the Louisiana coast. Delfin expects to bring the LNG terminal into service in late 2030.
Within three days of the explosion, the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration issued a corrective action order that mandated Delfin immediately repair, test and prove the pipe’s structural integrity before resuming operations. Federal regulators have not set a public comment period for the Delfin pipeline blowout.
The blast area was graded and restored to the previous elevation with soil hauled in or already existing on site, according to the compliance office’s public notice. Approximately 1,440 cubic yards of topsoil was required.
The Office of Coastal Management prefers that comments be uploaded directly to the state’s electronic record database on the Office of Permitting and Compliance’s web page. Landowners, environmental groups and members of the public have until Nov. 7 to file objections or submit written requests demanding a state public hearing to discuss the environmental and structural safety of the repairs.
In the spring, a coalition of 24 environmental and Louisiana-based groups sent a formal letter to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration demanding that the pipeline remain shut down until federal regulators force Delfin to hold an in-person public town hall in Cameron Parish.
In early February, James Hiatt, director of For a Better Bayou, said after the explosion that a major natural gas pipeline incident occurs in the United States about every 40 hours.
“One thing is always true about pipelines, they carry inherent risk and when something goes wrong the consequences can be severe,” Hiatt told the American Press. “If regulators are serious about safety, these lines must be kept well away from homes and sensitive ecosystems, not rushed through an expedited path for corporate convenience,” Hiatt said.
