Houston, Texas-based midstream company Enterprise Products Partners looks likely to become the first firm to export US oil since the lifting of the ban last week, after it announced on Wednesday that it has agreed to load a 600,000-barrel cargo of domestic light crude.
The loading will occur at the Enterprise Hydrocarbon Terminal (EHT) on the Houston Ship Channel during the first week of January 2016.
The cargo will be shipped for Swiss-based trading company Vitol, which will probably send it to Europe.
Last Friday, December 18, the US Congress passed an omnibus spending bill that included a measure to end what had been a 40-year ban on exports instituted in the 1970s in reaction to oil shortages in the US caused by the policies of some Middle East Opec (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) members. President Barack Obama signed the bill, which also included measures to incentivize green-energy initiatives.
