Enterprise Products Partners To Expand Export Capacity Of Crude, Liquefied Petroleum Gas, Propylene

Enterprise Products Partners to expand export capacity of crude, liquefied petroleum gas, propylene

10-Jul-19

Enterprise Products Partners plans to expand its ability to export crude, liquefied petroleum gas, and polymer grade propylene from the Enterprise Hydrocarbon Terminal on the Houston Ship Channel, as per SP Global Platts. The planned expansion will help debottleneck the gap created by increased Permian crude flows into the US Gulf Coast as pipeline takeaway capacity comes online ahead of export facility growth. The expansion will also address growing demand for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) exports and record demand for polymer-grade propylene (PGP) in international markets.

"We are pleased to announce this additional investment in our Houston Ship Channel marine terminals," AJ "Jim" Teague, CEO of Enterprise's general partner, said in a statement. "In total these expansions will enable us to load an incremental 1.3 million bpd of LPG, polymer-grade propylene and crude oil," he added. Enterprise estimates that by 2025 exports of US crude oil will increase to 8 million bpd. In April, the US Gulf Coast exported 2.6 million bpd of crude, according to Energy Information Administration data. As part of the expansion, Enterprise is also building an eighth dock at its Houston Ship Channel facility to accommodate a Suezmax tanker, the largest ship able to navigate the Ship Channel. This will add 840,000 bpd of crude export loading capacity to the facility, bringing the facility's total crude export capacity to 2.75 million bpd. The new dock is expected to be in service by the fourth quarter of 2020.

Enterprise expects the domestic LPG export market to double from 1.4 million BPD to 2.8 BPD by 2025. In April, the USGC exported 1.3 million bpd of LPGs out of the total US exports of 1.692 million bpd, EIA data showed. Currently, the facility's LPG loading capacity is 660,000 bpd. Enterprise's previously announced expansion project is on track to add 175,000 bpd by the late third quarter of 2019. With the additional projects announced Monday, the company will add 260,000 bpd of capacity by the third quarter of 2020, bringing the facility's nameplate capacity to almost 1.1 million bpd of LPG by that time. To address the growing international demand for PGP, Enterprise is adding refrigeration facilities at terminal that will add an additional 67,200 bpd of fully refrigerated PGP loading capacity. The expansion project will also allow Enterprise to co-load fully refrigerated PGP and LPG onto the same vessel. The project is expected to be operational in the fourth quarter of 2020.