El Paso's Southern Natural Gas works on line in Ala.

NEW YORK, May 11 (Reuters) - El Paso Corp (EP.N: Quote, Profile, Research) unit Southern Natural Gas Co said Monday it removed from service for repair a portion of the 24-inch north main line, located in north central Alabama between its Providence and Tarrant compressor stations, on its natural gas pipeline system.

"Based on the best information available at this time the line is not anticipated to return to service until late this week," the company said in a website posting.

While the outage had not impacted operations and was not likely to impact firm transportation on the line, the company said there could be an impact to some interruptible service and peak hourly capacity at points downstream of the Providence station.

Interruptible customers typically pay lower fees to ship gas with the understanding that volumes can be curtailed during periods of peak demand or during unplanned outages.

The 7-600-mile Southern Natural Gas pipeline system is part of El Paso's 42,000-mile interstate pipeline system connecting the nation's most prolific gas supply regions with the largest consuming regions in the U.S., transporting more than a quarter of daily natural gas consumption in the country. (Reporting by Eileen Moustakis; Editing by John Picinich)