Drivers on Kenai’s Bridge Access Road may have noticed that the construction equipment, workers, and orange signs that previously occupied the road’s east side have been replaced with a greenish material covering the ground.

According to an email from communications manager Lindsay Hobson of Enstar Natural Gas Company, which began laying a pipeline along Bridge Access Road in February, the portion of the pipeline along Bridge Access Road north of the Kenai River has been completed.

The approximately four-mile long pipeline will connect Enstar’s existing pipeline with the Cook Inlet Natural Gas Storage Alaska facility. The pipeline includes a completed 3000 foot section that passes below the Kenai River, which Enstar began drilling in late March.

Approximately 7000 feet of the pipeline still have to be constructed and laid in the ground, including 2000 feet along Bridge Access Road south of the Kenai River and 5,000 feet along Kalifornsky Beach Road, Hobson wrote.

When construction is complete, the project site will be inspected by the Army Corps of Engineers, which issued one of the 22 permits required for the pipeline. Hobson wrote that the Corps will look at whether the ground has been restored to its original elevation and whether the site has been adequately revegetated.

Hobson wrote that the green material, which now covers the ground where Enstar previously dug trenches and moved construction machinery over a temporary road of wooden pallets, is called tackifier. Enstar is revegetating the area with a process called hydroseeding, in which seed, fertilizer, mulch, and water are applied to the land in a single mixture of material. Hobson wrote that the seed-containing tackifier spread over the ground alongside Bridge Access Road is made of cotton fiber that holds moisture and helps ensure even spreading of seed.

Reach Ben Boettger at ben.boettger@peninsulaclarion.com

Ben Boettger/Peninsula Clarion Green material containing seed, moisture, and cotton fiber lies in the former construction area alongside Bridge Access Road on Tuesday April 28 in Kenai.