Kinder Morgan to increase gas storage capacity at Texas facility
May 31 (Reuters) — U.S. pipeline operator Kinder Morgan Inc said on Wednesday it plans to expand the working gas storage capacity at its Markham facility in Matagorda County, Texas, by 6 billion cubic feet (Bcf).
The decision comes after Kinder Morgan earned about $1 billion during February’s U.S. winter blast as heating demand pushed natural gas prices to record highs.
The company will lease an extra cavern at the facility, which will provide an additional 650 million cubic feet per day of withdrawal capacity on its Texas intrastate pipeline system, along with more storage capacity.
Before the expansion, the Markham facility had 21.8 Bcf of working gas storage capacity.
(Reporting by Ankit Kumar; Editing by Devika Syamnath)
Related Knowledge Center: Liquefied natural gas
Driven by plentiful natural gas produced from shale plays, the United States began exporting liquefied natural gas in 2016 when the Sabine Pass terminal in Louisiana opened and shipped its first cargo. Since then, additional capacity, or trains, have been added to Sabine Pass, and terminals have become operational in Cameron Parish, La.; Hackberry, La.; Cove Point, Md.; and Corpus Christi, Texas. The Energy Information Administration projects that U.S. LNG export capacity will reach 8.9 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) by the end of 2019, making it the third largest in the world, behind Australia and Qatar. The tariff war with China has the potential to impact some final investment decisions for additional terminals in the coming months.