Willbros to build Enterprise ethane export line

OREANDA-NEWS. June 09, 2015. Enterprise Products Partners has hired contractor Willbros Group to construct an ethane export pipeline on the US Gulf coast.

The 15.5-mile pipeline will transport ethane from Enterprise's storage facilities at Mont Belvieu, Texas, to the planned ethane export terminal at Barbour's Cut, on Galveston Bay.

Enterprise's 240,000 b/d ethane export facility is expected on line in the third quarter of 2016.

Willbros will begin the project this month and expects to complete the pipeline in November. It is unclear how Enterprise will use the pipeline before the completion of its export facilities.

The first US waterborne ethane exports are expected to begin in the second half of this year once Sunoco Logistics completes its ethane operations at the NGL export terminal at Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania.

Enterprise also owns and operates an LPG terminal on the Houston Ship Channel with a capacity of 9mn bl/month after completing an expansion in early April. Enterprise expects to complete its final LPG terminal expansion in the fourth quarter, which will bring export capacity to 16mn bl/month of LPG, or 29 vessel loadings per month.