ONEOK Partners, L.P. plans to invest approximately $365 million to $470 million to construct a new 200-million cubic feet per day natural gas processing facility, dubbed the Knox plant, in the Oklahoma counties of Grady and Stephens. The facility will be designed to gather and process natural gas from the emerging South Central Oklahoma Oil Province.

"The Knox plant in Oklahoma will increase our presence in the growing SCOOP play and increase our Oklahoma natural gas processing capacity to approximately 900 MMcf/d," said Terry K. Spencer, President/CEO, ONEOK Partners.

The Knox plant and related infrastructure, including expansions and upgrades to the partnership's existing natural gas gathering systems and compression are expected to be completed during the fourth quarter 2016.

The approximately $365 million to $470 million includes:

$175 million to $240 million for the construction of the Knox plant; and

$190 million to $230 million for the construction of related natural gas infrastructure, including natural gas gathering pipelines and natural gas compression.

The Knox plant is the partnership's first new plant to be built in the emerging SCOOP play and will process natural gas from secured acreage dedications in the area.

"This new plant will accommodate increased production of liquids-rich natural gas in the SCOOP play where we have substantial acreage dedications from active producers and will be located in close proximity to the partnership's existing natural gas and natural gas liquids pipelines," Spencer added.

In addition, the partnership has announced total investments of approximately $6.4 billion to $6.8 billion through 2016 for acquisitions and infrastructure growth projects related to natural gas gathering and processing, and natural gas liquids, which includes the projects described above.

These investments consist of approximately $3.4 billion to $3.7 billion for natural gas gathering and processing projects, and approximately $3.0 billion to $3.1 billion for natural gas liquids projects. Approximately $3.1 billion to $3.3 billion are for growth projects related to resource development in the Williston Basin in North Dakota, the partnership said.