EIA: Increased petrochemical consumption will expand ethane production

According to the EIA’s ‘Short Term Energy Outlook’, ethane production is expected to increase from 1.1 million bpd in 2015 to 1.4 million bpd in 2017, accounting for two thirds of total US hydrocarbon gas liquid (HGL) production growth. Ethane, a key feedstock for petrochemical manufacturing, is recovered from raw natural gas at natural gas processing plants.

Over the past five or six years, the amount of ethane contained in domestically produced raw natural gas has exceeded the capacity to consume and export it. This oversupply kept ethane prices relatively low, hovering at, or below, the price of natural gas, leading producers to reject the ethane stream by leaving it mixed with the stream that is marketed as pipeline natural gas, which is mostly methane.

Beginning in 2012, the availability of relatively inexpensive ethane encouraged a wave of investments in ethane consuming petrochemical plants and export facilities. The recognition that these investments would provide an outlet for US ethane also encouraged investment in facilities to recover ethane from raw natural gas and to transport it to market. Many of these projects, including de-ethanisation facilities, ethane pipelines, petrochemical plants, and ethane export facilities, have either recently been completed or are currently under construction and will come online in the next few years. These projects increase take away capacity for ethane, especially in the Marcellus and Utica shale regions, mainly in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia, where market outlets for rapidly growing natural gas supply were previously limited to pipeline natural gas.

As new ethane consuming petrochemical and export capacity reduces the ethane oversupply in 2016 and 2017, ethane prices are expected to generally remain above natural gas prices, leading to a rise in ethane recovery to meet demand and export growth. EIA's recent report on the 'Short Term Outlook for Hydrocarbon Gas Liquids' examines ethane production, consumption, exports, and infrastructure projects.

US ethane consumption, which was 1.05 million bpd in 2015, is forecast to increase 50 000 bpd in 2016 as expansion projects at ethylene producing petrochemical plants increase feedstock demand for ethane. In 2017, ethane consumption is projected to increase another 80 000 bpd as capacity begins to ramp up at five new petrochemical plants and at a previously deactivated plant.

In 2014, the US switched from being a net importer of ethane to a net exporter after the opening of two new ethane pipelines that began transporting ethane from North Dakota and southwestern Pennsylvania to Canada. EIA's 'Short Term Energy Outlook' (STEO) expects annual average ethane net exports to increase from 60 000 bpd in 2015 to 230 000 bpd in 2017, as new export facilities and ethane carrying ships enable ethane to reach overseas markets. On 9 March, the US shipped the first waterborne exports of ethane from the Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania terminal to Europe. A second ethane terminal is expected to open at Morgan's Point, Texas in the 3Q16. The two terminals are expected to export ethane mainly to European and Asian countries.

Adapted from press release by Francesca Brindle

Read the article online at: https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/petrochemicals/01042016/us-eia-ethane-production-increase-as-petrochemical-market-expands-2923/