By being grid-connected and sharing energy storage on the grid, they'd also provide the pipeline company with a synergistic revenue stream for ancillary services.

Now you're speaking their language and underscoring perhaps the real motivation, rather than the sustainability 'do the right thing' idea. But hey, motivation matters much less than results!

David, do we really know the "rest of the story" about wind?

Warren Buffett, as he did with so many other investments, saw the writing on the wall when he told a group of investors in 2014:

"I will do anything that is basically covered by the law to reduce Berkshire's tax rate," Buffet told an audience in Omaha, Nebraska recently. "For example, on wind energy, we get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms. That's the only reason to build them. They don't make sense without the tax credit."

After $billions of dollars in investment wind now provides a whopping 7.3% of U.S. electricity, barely making a dent in U.S. CO2 emissions. And with the Investment Tax Credit ending in 2022, now might be a good time to get out of the market.

Looks like an investor would have been right to scoff in the 1990s - and even more so, now (wind, below, is shown by the brown line creeping along the x-axis).
 

David - the big focus for gathering and pipelines is now methane.  The challenge with existing gas transmissions pipelines is that their customers will have to pay for the upgrades, highly regulated.  At some point they may become big proponents of electricity if they can get a rate of return on the added investment, the challenge wil be the fact that they are investing in moving a product that some think we do not need - natural gas.  The time horizons are different than for the electricity monopolies who are making the case for all carbon free energy and hoping that the regulators will allow them a return on the transition.