MARAD: EIS plans for TX VLCC port

The U.S. Maritime Administration published a Notice of Intent (NoI) July 3 in the Federal Register that both MARAD and the U.S. Coast Guard will be preparing an environmental impact statement (EIS) as part of an environmental review of Phillips 66’s (PSX) Bluewater Texas Terminal LLC’s Deepwater Port License application. The port would be located in federal waters about 15 nautical miles off the coast of San Patricio County, Texas. The deepwater port would allow for the loading of Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs) and other sized crude oil cargo carriers via a single point mooring buoy system. PSX announced in June that the port would be an expansion of the company’s logistics business and would compete with other export terminals planning to dispatch domestic oil across the globe. The only current oil terminal on the Gulf Coast that can handle VLCCs is the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP), located 18 nautical miles off the coast of Fourchon, La. LOOP's onshore facilities, Fourchon Booster Station and Clovelly Dome Storage Terminal, are located just on-shore at Port Fourchon and 25 miles inland at Galliano, La. The Bluewater Texas Terminal may commence operations by 2021, following approvals from Texas regulators, U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Maritime Administration. There will be a public meeting in connection with Bluewater’s application in Corpus Christi, from 6-8 p.m., on July 22 at the Omni Corpus Christi Hotel. Materials submitted in response to this request on the application must reach the Federal Docket Management Facility in Washington, D.C., by July 31, 2019. Comments may also be sent electronically through the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov. (Source: Federal Register 07/03/19)