Pipeline operator EPIC to begin US crude export operations by year-end

HOUSTON: EPIC Midstream Holdings LP has begun filling a new 400,000 barrel per day (bpd) oil pipeline that stretches from the Permian Basin to the US Gulf Coast and will start exporting from its own South Texas terminal by the end of this year, President Brian Freed said in an interview on Monday.

The San Antonio pipeline operator has begun construction on a second dock at its export terminal in Corpus Christi, Texas, that next year will be capable of loading tankers that carry up to 1 million barrels, known as Suezmax tankers, Freed said.

In the third quarter, EPIC will make the first deliveries on one of three new pipelines helping to ease a crude oil bottleneck that has weighed on prices in the Permian of West Texas and New Mexico for more than a year.

Crude flows will ramp up each month after the start of interim service as the company adds more storage tanks in the Permian and its facilities at Gardensdale and Robstown, Texas.

"We'll have tanks coming on every month," Freed said. "We'll be bringing on different tankage at different locations all along the way."