Offshore Texas oil port to cost $2 billion

FREEPORT, Texas, Aug. 18 (UPI) -- Refinery expansion along the Texas Gulf Coast has pushed U.S. and German oil companies to build a $2 billion offshore oil port, the companies say.

Enterprise Products Partners and TEPPCO Partners have teamed up with Oiltanking Holdings Americas, slated for construction 36 miles off the coast of Freeport, Texas, the Houston Chronicle reported Monday.

The floating port will include facilities for two supertankers and pump oil through 160 miles of pipelines for deliveries to Texas refineries in Houston, Port Arthur and Beaumont.

"The main catalyst for this project is the expansion that's taking place at refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast," Wynne Harvey, a director of commercial development with Enterprise, told the Chronicle.

Refinery expansions at a Motiva plant in Port Arthur and a Valero plant in San Antonio, costing $7 billion and $1.4 billion, respectively, are expected to raise production by 430,000 barrels per day, the newspaper said.

The Texas Offshore Port System, or TOPS, could start operations in 2010 with an uploading capacity of 1.8 million barrels per day, roughly 18 percent of the current U.S. import load, the report said.