Enterprise

Enterprise Products Partners LP said it may consider raising tariffs of its Seaway Pipeline, one week after a competitor, TransCanada Corp., told federal regulators that it wants to increase the temporary discounted spot rate for light crude from Cushing, OK, to Houston and Port Arthur, TX.

Enterprise Products Partners LP’s management team said it believes higher rigs counts in the Permian Basin, as well as the Haynesville and Eagle Ford shales, will inexorably lead to higher oil and natural gas volumes flowing through its systems, beginning in the second half of the year.

Enterprise Products Partners LP said it will tap the Permian Basin with a new pipeline to carry natural gas liquids (NGL) to its fractionation and storage complex in Mont Belvieu, TX.

An affiliate of Enterprise Products Partners LP has agreed to acquire the midstream business and assets of Azure Midstream Partners LP and its operating subsidiaries in East Texas and North Louisiana.

The worst of the commodity price rout is over, according to Enterprise Products Partners LP management. Among other things, company executives are watching producer activity in plays such as the Permian Basin, Eagle Ford and Haynesville shales, and they’re seeing signs of better times to come.

Companies never like to comment on “rumors or speculation,” but sometimes all the gossip can be too much for a multi-billion-dollar organization to bear. Enterprise Products Partners LP and Williams are an example.

Customers recently canceled some liquid petroleum gas (LPG) loadings at Enterprise Products Partners LP’s Gulf Coast terminal, but this month the company loaded a record number of polymer grade propylene (PGP) cargos. And the first ethane commissioning cargo is due to leave next month from the company’s Houston Ship Channel (HSC) terminal.

Enterprise Products Partners LP has loaded its first two vessels with polymer-grade propylene (PGP) for export at the Enterprise Hydrocarbons Terminal (EHT) along the Houston Ship Channel, adding a new service at the facility. The company is expecting an increase in the number of PGP export cargoes in response to growing international demand. It has the capability to load 5,000 metric tons per day of refrigerated PGP at the EHT dock facilities, which are supplied by propylene fractionators and storage wells at Enterprise’s Mont Belvieu, TX, complex. “Our EHT facility provides us with the enhanced efficiency and additional capacity we need to meet the increased demand from our customers looking to export PGP, which is price advantaged due to the shale revolution,” said Jim Teague, CEO of Enterprise’s general partner. “With the addition of our 1.65 billion pound PDH [propane dehydrogenation] plant, which is scheduled to begin service in the second quarter of 2017 [see Daily GPI,Jan. 28], Enterprise will have the capability to produce 7.5 billion pounds of propylene per year, sufficient to meet the needs of our domestic and international customers.”

Offshore natural gas producers in the Gulf of Mexico that rely on the Destin Pipeline to transport supplies to the U.S. onshore were looking for alternative routes following an explosion that shuttered Enterprise Products Partners LP’s Pascagoula gas processing plant in Mississippi.