Additional storage space should provide Noble more flexibility in its physical trading business. The company continues to grow aggressively in the oil trading segment. In the past year, it bought terminaling and pipeline in the U.S. Midwest, and distillates trading and marketing business on the Gulf
Coast.
Noble is a 50% joint-venture partner of the new 3.145 million bbl oil products and biofuel terminal. The other 50% partner is HES Beheer NV in Rotterdam.
The plan to construct the new terminal, which will store mostly clean oil products, was announced earlier this year. The terminal will be constructed in two phases, with the first phase set to complete in September 2011.
The new terminal will be built from the ground up in a site that used to house an agricultural products silo.
“The piling for the new terminal started two weeks ago,” the official said.
The first phase of the terminal will have a total capacity of 200,000 cubic meters (1.26 million bbl), with 817,675 bbl dedicated to oil products and remaining 440,286 bbl for edible vegetable oil or biofuels.
Boltek Tank Terminal, the joint-venture company owning and operating the terminal, has locked in more than 50% of the capacity in the first phase to long-term storage contracts.
The second phase will increase the total storage capacity to 3.145 million bbl. Petroleum products will remain the main commodities stored at the terminal when the second phase is completed in 2014.