General	9 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2012
Organization, Consolidation and Presentation of Financial Statements [Abstract]
General	General Organization Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. is a leading pipeline transportation and energy storage company in North America, and unless the context requires otherwise, references to “we,” “us,” “our,” “KMP” or the “Partnership” are intended to mean Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. and its consolidated subsidiaries. We own an interest in or operate approximately 53,000 miles of pipelines and 180 terminals, and conduct our business through five reportable business segments (described further in Note 8). Our pipelines transport natural gas, refined petroleum products, crude oil, carbon dioxide and other products, and our terminals store petroleum products and chemicals, and handle such products as ethanol, coal, petroleum coke and steel. We are also the leading producer and transporter of carbon dioxide, commonly called CO₂, for enhanced oil recovery projects in North America. Our general partner is owned by Kinder Morgan, Inc., as discussed below. Kinder Morgan, Inc. and Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc. Kinder Morgan, Inc., a Delaware corporation and referred to as KMI in this report, indirectly owns all the common stock of our general partner, Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc., a Delaware corporation; however, in July 2007, our general partner issued and sold to a third party 100,000 shares of Series A fixed-to-floating rate term cumulative preferred stock due 2057. The consent of holders of a majority of these preferred shares is required with respect to a commencement of or a filing of a voluntary bankruptcy proceeding with respect to us or two of our subsidiaries, SFPP, L.P. and Calnev Pipe Line LLC. On February 29, 2012, Kinder Morgan Kansas, Inc., a Kansas corporation, merged with and into its parent, Kinder Morgan Holdco DE Inc., a Delaware corporation and a wholly-owned subsidiary of KMI. Immediately following this merger, Kinder Morgan Holdco DE Inc. (the surviving legal entity from the merger) then merged with and into its parent KMI. KMI’s common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “KMI.” As of September 30, 2012, KMI and its consolidated subsidiaries owned, through KMI’s general and limited partner interests in us and its ownership of shares issued by its subsidiary Kinder Morgan Management, LLC (discussed following), an approximate 13% interest in us. On May 25, 2012, KMI acquired all of the outstanding shares of El Paso Corporation (referred to as EP in this report) in a transaction that created one of the largest energy companies in the United States. On March 15, 2012, KMI announced that it had reached an agreement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to divest certain of our assets in order to receive regulatory approval for its proposed EP acquisition. Subject to final FTC approval, KMI agreed to sell our (i) Kinder Morgan Interstate Gas Transmission natural gas pipeline system; (ii) Trailblazer natural gas pipeline system; (iii) Casper and Douglas natural gas processing operations; and (iv) 50% equity investment in the Rockies Express natural gas pipeline system. In this report, we refer to this combined group of assets as our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group. Prior to KMI’s announcement, we included the assets we are required to sell pursuant to the FTC's order in our Natural Gas Pipelines business segment. Because this combined group of assets, including our equity investment in Rockies Express, has its own operations and cash flows, we now report this FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group as a business held for sale. We expect to complete the sale of our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group in November 2012. For more information about this planned divestiture, see both “—Basis of Presentation” below and Note 2 "Acquisitions and Discontinued Operations—FTC Natural Gas Pipelines Disposal Group - Discontinued Operations." Kinder Morgan Management, LLC Kinder Morgan Management, LLC, referred to as KMR in this report, is a Delaware limited liability company. Our general partner owns all of KMR’s voting securities and, pursuant to a delegation of control agreement, has delegated to KMR, to the fullest extent permitted under Delaware law and our partnership agreement, all of its power and authority to manage and control our business and affairs, except that KMR cannot take certain specified actions without the approval of our general partner. KMR’s shares representing limited liability company interests trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “KMR.” More information about the entities referred to above and the delegation of control agreement is contained in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011 and in our Current Report on Form 8-K filed May 1, 2012. In this report, we refer to our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011 as our 2011 Form 10-K. Basis of Presentation We have prepared our accompanying unaudited consolidated financial statements under the rules and regulations of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. These rules and regulations conform to the accounting principles contained in the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s Accounting Standards Codification, the single source of generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America and referred to in this report as the Codification. Under such rules and regulations, we have condensed or omitted certain information and notes normally included in financial statements prepared in conformity with the Codification. We believe, however, that our disclosures are adequate to make the information presented not misleading. Our accompanying consolidated financial statements reflect normal adjustments, and also recurring adjustments that are, in the opinion of our management, necessary for a fair statement of our financial results for the interim periods, and certain amounts from prior periods have been reclassified to conform to the current presentation. Interim results are not necessarily indicative of results for a full year; accordingly, you should read these consolidated financial statements in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and related notes included in our 2011 Form 10-K and in our Current Report on Form 8-K filed May 1, 2012. Our accounting records are maintained in United States dollars, and all references to dollars are United States dollars, except where stated otherwise. Canadian dollars are designated as C$. Our consolidated financial statements include our accounts and those of our operating partnerships and their majority-owned and controlled subsidiaries, and all significant intercompany items have been eliminated in consolidation. Our financial statements are consolidated into the consolidated financial statements of KMI; however, except for the related party transactions described in Note 9 “Related Party Transactions—Asset Acquisitions,” KMI is not liable for, and its assets are not available to satisfy, the obligations of us and/or our subsidiaries and vice versa. Responsibility for payments of obligations reflected in our or KMI’s financial statements is a legal determination based on the entity that incurs the liability. Furthermore, the determination of responsibility for payment among entities in our consolidated group of subsidiaries is not impacted by the consolidation of our financial statements into the consolidated financial statements of KMI. Following KMI’s March 15, 2012 announcement of its intention to sell the assets that comprise our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group (described above in “—Kinder Morgan, Inc. and Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc.”), we accounted for the disposal group as discontinued operations in accordance with the provisions of the “Presentation of Financial Statements—Discontinued Operations” Topic of the Codification. Accordingly, we (i) reclassified and excluded the FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group’s results of operations from our results of continuing operations and reported the disposal group’s results of operations separately as “Income from operations of FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group” within the discontinued operations section of our accompanying consolidated statements of income for all periods presented; (ii) separately reported a “Loss from costs to sell and the remeasurement of FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group to fair value” within the discontinued operations section of our accompanying consolidated statements of income for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2012; and (iii) reclassified and reported the disposal group’s combined assets within “Assets held for sale” in our accompanying consolidated balance sheet as of September 30, 2012. Because the disposal group’s combined liabilities were not material to our consolidated balance sheet, we included the disposal group’s liabilities within “Accrued other current liabilities” in our accompanying consolidated balance sheet as of September 30, 2012. In addition, we did not elect to present separately the operating, investing and financing cash flows related to the disposal group in our accompanying consolidated statements of cash flows. For more information about the discontinued operations of our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group, see Note 2 "Acquisitions and Discontinued Operations—FTC Natural Gas Pipelines Disposal Group - Discontinued Operations." Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit We compute Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit by dividing our limited partners’ interest in net income (loss) by the weighted average number of units outstanding during the period. The overall computation, presentation, and disclosure requirements for our Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit are made in accordance with the “Earnings per Share” Topic of the Codification.

General

Organization

Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. is a leading pipeline transportation and energy storage company in North America, and unless the context requires otherwise, references to “we,” “us,” “our,” “KMP” or the “Partnership” are intended to mean Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. and its consolidated subsidiaries. We own an interest in or operate approximately 53,000 miles of pipelines and 180 terminals, and conduct our business through five reportable business segments (described further in Note 8). Our pipelines transport natural gas, refined petroleum products, crude oil, carbon dioxide and other products, and our terminals store petroleum products and chemicals, and handle such products as ethanol, coal, petroleum coke and steel. We are also the leading producer and transporter of carbon dioxide, commonly called CO₂, for enhanced oil recovery projects in North America. Our general partner is owned by Kinder Morgan, Inc., as discussed below.

Kinder Morgan, Inc. and Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc.

Kinder Morgan, Inc., a Delaware corporation and referred to as KMI in this report, indirectly owns all the common stock of our general partner, Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc., a Delaware corporation; however, in July 2007, our general partner issued and sold to a third party 100,000 shares of Series A fixed-to-floating rate term cumulative preferred stock due 2057. The consent of holders of a majority of these preferred shares is required with respect to a commencement of or a filing of a voluntary bankruptcy proceeding with respect to us or two of our subsidiaries, SFPP, L.P. and Calnev Pipe Line LLC.

On February 29, 2012, Kinder Morgan Kansas, Inc., a Kansas corporation, merged with and into its parent, Kinder Morgan Holdco DE Inc., a Delaware corporation and a wholly-owned subsidiary of KMI. Immediately following this merger, Kinder Morgan Holdco DE Inc. (the surviving legal entity from the merger) then merged with and into its parent KMI. KMI’s common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “KMI.” As of September 30, 2012, KMI and its consolidated subsidiaries owned, through KMI’s general and limited partner interests in us and its ownership of shares issued by its subsidiary Kinder Morgan Management, LLC (discussed following), an approximate 13% interest in us.

On May 25, 2012, KMI acquired all of the outstanding shares of El Paso Corporation (referred to as EP in this report) in a transaction that created one of the largest energy companies in the United States.

On March 15, 2012, KMI announced that it had reached an agreement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to divest certain of our assets in order to receive regulatory approval for its proposed EP acquisition. Subject to final FTC approval, KMI agreed to sell our (i) Kinder Morgan Interstate Gas Transmission natural gas pipeline system; (ii) Trailblazer natural gas pipeline system; (iii) Casper and Douglas natural gas processing operations; and (iv) 50% equity investment in the Rockies Express natural gas pipeline system. In this report, we refer to this combined group of assets as our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group.

Prior to KMI’s announcement, we included the assets we are required to sell pursuant to the FTC's order in our Natural Gas Pipelines business segment. Because this combined group of assets, including our equity investment in Rockies Express, has its own operations and cash flows, we now report this FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group as a business held for sale. We expect to complete the sale of our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group in November 2012. For more information about this planned divestiture, see both “—Basis of Presentation” below and Note 2 "Acquisitions and Discontinued Operations—FTC Natural Gas Pipelines Disposal Group - Discontinued Operations."

Kinder Morgan Management, LLC

Kinder Morgan Management, LLC, referred to as KMR in this report, is a Delaware limited liability company. Our general partner owns all of KMR’s voting securities and, pursuant to a delegation of control agreement, has delegated to KMR, to the fullest extent permitted under Delaware law and our partnership agreement, all of its power and authority to manage and control our business and affairs, except that KMR cannot take certain specified actions without the approval of our general partner. KMR’s shares representing limited liability company interests trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “KMR.”

More information about the entities referred to above and the delegation of control agreement is contained in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011 and in our Current Report on Form 8-K filed May 1, 2012. In this report, we refer to our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011 as our 2011 Form 10-K.

Basis of Presentation

We have prepared our accompanying unaudited consolidated financial statements under the rules and regulations of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. These rules and regulations conform to the accounting principles contained in the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s Accounting Standards Codification, the single source of generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America and referred to in this report as the Codification. Under such rules and regulations, we have condensed or omitted certain information and notes normally included in financial statements prepared in conformity with the Codification. We believe, however, that our disclosures are adequate to make the information presented not misleading.

Our accompanying consolidated financial statements reflect normal adjustments, and also recurring adjustments that are, in the opinion of our management, necessary for a fair statement of our financial results for the interim periods, and certain amounts from prior periods have been reclassified to conform to the current presentation. Interim results are not necessarily indicative of results for a full year; accordingly, you should read these consolidated financial statements in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and related notes included in our 2011 Form 10-K and in our Current Report on Form 8-K filed May 1, 2012.

Our accounting records are maintained in United States dollars, and all references to dollars are United States dollars, except where stated otherwise. Canadian dollars are designated as C$. Our consolidated financial statements include our accounts and those of our operating partnerships and their majority-owned and controlled subsidiaries, and all significant intercompany items have been eliminated in consolidation.

Our financial statements are consolidated into the consolidated financial statements of KMI; however, except for the related party transactions described in Note 9 “Related Party Transactions—Asset Acquisitions,” KMI is not liable for, and its assets are not available to satisfy, the obligations of us and/or our subsidiaries and vice versa. Responsibility for payments of obligations reflected in our or KMI’s financial statements is a legal determination based on the entity that incurs the liability. Furthermore, the determination of responsibility for payment among entities in our consolidated group of subsidiaries is not impacted by the consolidation of our financial statements into the consolidated financial statements of KMI.

Following KMI’s March 15, 2012 announcement of its intention to sell the assets that comprise our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group (described above in “—Kinder Morgan, Inc. and Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc.”), we accounted for the disposal group as discontinued operations in accordance with the provisions of the “Presentation of Financial Statements—Discontinued Operations” Topic of the Codification. Accordingly, we (i) reclassified and excluded the FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group’s results of operations from our results of continuing operations and reported the disposal group’s results of operations separately as “Income from operations of FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group” within the discontinued operations section of our accompanying consolidated statements of income for all periods presented; (ii) separately reported a “Loss from costs to sell and the remeasurement of FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group to fair value” within the discontinued operations section of our accompanying consolidated statements of income for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2012; and (iii) reclassified and reported the disposal group’s combined assets within “Assets held for sale” in our accompanying consolidated balance sheet as of September 30, 2012.

Because the disposal group’s combined liabilities were not material to our consolidated balance sheet, we included the disposal group’s liabilities within “Accrued other current liabilities” in our accompanying consolidated balance sheet as of September 30, 2012. In addition, we did not elect to present separately the operating, investing and financing cash flows related to the disposal group in our accompanying consolidated statements of cash flows. For more information about the discontinued operations of our FTC Natural Gas Pipelines disposal group, see Note 2 "Acquisitions and Discontinued Operations—FTC Natural Gas Pipelines Disposal Group - Discontinued Operations."

Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit

We compute Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit by dividing our limited partners’ interest in net income (loss) by the weighted average number of units outstanding during the period. The overall computation, presentation, and disclosure requirements for our Limited Partners’ Net Income (Loss) per Unit are made in accordance with the “Earnings per Share” Topic of the Codification.