Louisiana Rain

Increasing U.S. shale oil production has benefitted many U.S. refineries, but along the Gulf Coast, the primary beneficiaries have been in Texas. As production increased in the Permian and Eagle Ford plays, new pipelines were built to supply refinery centers in Corpus Christi, Houston, and Beaumont/Port Arthur. In contrast, the availability of shale crude by pipeline to refineries in Southeast Louisiana has lagged. However, new pipeline capacity to the crude hub in St. James, LA, is about to change the dynamic in a major way. Today, we continue our series on St. James by discussing the Bayou State’s refinery infrastructure and how new pipelines could impact refinery crude slates.

Imagine a crude oil hub with all this: a central location near the Gulf Coast; pipeline, waterborne and rail access to a wide range of imported and domestic crude; tens of millions of barrels of storage capacity; direct connections by pipe to nearly a dozen major refineries; and the ability to load “neat” or blended barrels of oil onto Aframax-class vessels for export. You’ve conjured up the hub in Louisiana’s St. James Parish, which is fast-becoming an even more significant market player, with even broader access to U.S. and Canadian crude supplies and, very likely, direct outbound links to one or more export terminals capable of fully loading VLCCs. Today, we continue our series on St. James with a look at its storage assets and at the pipes that flow into and out of the hub.

Throughout the middle and latter parts of the 2010s, crude oil production growth in major U.S. basins and in Western Canada — not to mention the end to the ban on most U.S. crude exports in December 2015 — has caused noteworthy shifts in crude flow patterns, stressed existing pipeline infrastructure, and highlighted the importance of crude storage and distribution hubs. A common theme through all this has been that more and more crude needs to find its way to the Gulf Coast, with its bounty of refineries and export docks. To that end, lately, there’s been a slew of new pipeline and export-terminal projects announced that are tied to the St. James crude trading hub, which is located in Louisiana, about 60 miles up the Mississippi River from New Orleans. Today, we begin a series on St. James and why it’s becoming an even bigger player in crude markets.