First shale gas cargo from USA to arrive in the UK

26-Sep-16

Petrochemical maker INEOS will receive its first U.S. shale gas shipment in the UK next week, following a cargo shipped to its ethane cracker in Norway earlier this year, Kallanish Energy reports. The shipment aboard an INEOS so-called Dragon Class ship will arrive on Tuesday in Scotland’s Firth of Forth. The specially designed ship, which left the U.S.’s Marcus Hook terminal near Philadelphia, is part of a fleet of eight of the world’s largest ethane-capable carriers. The cheap fuel will be used as both a feedstock and a power source at INEOS’s Grangemouth petrochemical plant in Scotland.

In April, INEOS and Pennsylvania-based independent producer Rex Energy signed a new natural gas liquids sale and purchase agreement covering ethane, propane and butane. The NGLs will be transported through Sunoco Logistics’ Mariner East pipeline and exported by sea from the Marcus Hook terminal to INEOS’s crackers in Scotland and Norway.