A week after Corpus Christi, Texas, became the first port of departure for a US oil cargo since the export ban was lifted, the Houston Ship Channel was poised on Thursday to send its first load of crude, according to Houston media outlets.
The Houston Ship Channel is one of the busiest trade waterways in the world and home to a plethora of oil and chemical terminals so it was not surprising that initial reports forecast Enterprise Hydrocarbon Terminal (EHT) on the Channel would be the groundbreaker.
That milestone honour instead went to the Port of Corpus Christi last week on New Year’s Eve when San Antonio-based NuStar Energy transported oil sold by Houston-based ConocoPhillips to Swiss oil trader Vitol. Tanker Theo T carried the load for a destination in Europe.
On Wednesday Houston-based Enterprise Products Partners began loading the Liberia-flagged Angelica Schulte with 600,000 barrels of oil also purchased by Vitol. It is expected to depart late on Thursday or early on Friday, again for Europe.
The federal ban on US oil exports was lifted on December 18 when the US Congress passed an omnibus spending bill that included a measure to axe the ban. President Barack Obama signed it into law. The ban had been introduced in the 1970s as a reaction to that era’s oil crisis.
