US Ethane Exports Evergas to Ship US Ethane to Europe for Ineos

Evergas will provide shipping services for Ineos: Under a 15-year shipping agreement, the company will operate six LNG tankers to transport ethane into Europe from the US Mariner East project. The contract allows Evergas to place new orders for tank ships.

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Following the agreement, Evergas will expand its series of 27.500 cbm LNG/Multigas refrigerated tankships (currently under construction at Chinese shipyard Sinopacific) to a total of six vessels. These ships are specially dedicated to transport ethane from Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, to Rafnes, Norway, and Grangemouth, UK, where Ineos operates several cracker projects.

This deal makes Ineos the first company to establish seaborne intercontinental ethane transportation: Already in 2012,Ineos announced that it had completed supply agreements with Range Resources for the lifting of ethane from the Marcus Hook Facility from 2015 on. At the same time, the company finalised Pipeline Transportation Services and Terminal Services Agreements for the shipping of ethane from Houston, Pennsylvania, to Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, with subsidiaries of Sunoco. Following these deals, Ineos began with the construction of a new tank and expanded infrastructure at its Rafnes site in Norway, scheduled for completion in 2015.

Tailor Made Solution for US Gas Export

"These shipping agreements are the final piece of the Mariner East Project, allowing Ineos to import competitively priced ethane to our Rafnes cracker from the US. Evergas' proposed solution matches perfectly our needs and offers innovative solutions such as the dual-fuel capability,” stated David Thompson, COO of Ineos Trading & Shipping. "Having worked successfully with Evergas for more than a decade we are very confident that these vessels will provide long term security and competitiveness of our feedstock supplies”.

Worlds’ Largest LNG-Ethane Multigas Carriers

The new ships will be the largest, most flexible and advanced multigas carriers to date, securing Ineos with a highly flexible solution for their ethane supplies, yet at the same time providing the benefit of transporting LNG, LPG as well as petrochemical gases including ethylene. Martin Ackermann, CEO of EVERGAS says: “The advanced design of these vessels offers very high efficiency and unparalleled flexibility to Ineos securing the longevity and strong position of their business.” The dual-fueled vessels will with the use of clean LNG on its modern tier III engines comply with all current and known future regulations securing low emissions and fuel cost.

Shale Gas Fueling the Future

A relentless increase in the world’s demand for energy and with gas rapidly replacing other fossil fuels in the global energy mix the demand growth for marine gas transportation is expected to be strong in the years ahead. Demand growth is further spurred by significant expected changes in demand for shale gas driven transportation, demand for gas as a marine fuel and development of short-haul marine redistribution networks.

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