HOUSTON—It’s the red dotted line that first catches the eye. That’s the indicator on the chart tracking the immense increase in natural gas pipeline capacity in the Northeast—about 15 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d)—that is scheduled to come into service from third-quarter 2016 through third-quarter 2017.

Problem is, most of it won’t.

Luke Jackson, senior analyst for S&P Platts, watched growth in gas production from the Marcellus and Utica plays and realized that the regional bottleneck is going to worsen into a long-term headache despite a host of projects launched to relieve it.

“Delays are at the forefront and the Northeast simply cannot grow without additional infrastructure being put into place,” he said at the recent S&P Global Energy Symposium. “You’re also starting to see basis differentials tighten up compared to Henry Hub.”

Stewart Glickman, sector head of energy and materials at S&P Global Market Intelligence, echoed Jackson’s concerns about getting projects to fruition. Of the 42 projects that the firm’s analysts are tracking, 21 are categorized as early development. That means that the permitting process has started but nothing has been approved; there is no financing in place and contractors have not yet been signed up.

“There are lots of reasons why getting from A to B is not a simple procedure,” he said.

One is the historical structure of midstream pipeline companies, which has tended to be the MLP. These companies offered generous yields to attract investors who would fund their aggressive growth projects.

That worked until late 2014, when the price of oil began to plunge, taking other commodity prices and the bullishness of the industry along with it.

“A lot of pipelines have found religion at this point,” Glickman said. “The MLPs and the GPs that support them—you’re seeing what used to be chronic overspending starting to move in the direction of these companies really trying to do a better job of living within their means.”

S&P’s forecast for U.S. gas production is relatively flat for the rest of 2016, Jackson said, but 2017 will show significant growth of about 2 Bcf/d, the bulk of it coming from the Northeast. Some will also come from the Southeast, with Texas and the Midcontinent picking up in the latter part of the year.

Transporting all of that gas becomes problematic, he said, because approvals to date from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) only cover projects with capacity of about 0.5 Bcf/d a day so far. That’s far from the 15 Bcf/d announced by the pipeline companies, Jackson said.

“That gives an idea,” he said, “of why we think there are very likely delays in when these projects are going forward.”

Joseph Markman can be reached at jmarkman@hartenergy.com or @JHMarkman.