Storage services group Oiltanking North America has bought about 22 acres of waterfront and industrial land in Texas City, Texas, USA, in order to develop a new deepwater terminal serving the Houston refining and chemical market.

The Texas Independent Deepwater Expansion (TIDE) terminal has land readily available for building more than 1.6 million m³ (or 10 million barrels), of storage, pipeline interconnectivity and additional jetties as needed for crude oil, petroleum and gas products. During the initial phase, a finger pier will be built with two deepwater docks up to 14 meters draft.

Once the initial phase has been completed, Oiltanking said the terminal will form a viable export/import/blending hub alternative in the Houston market by creating a premier logistics platform with significant flexibility and options. The TIDE facility is very close to Oiltanking’s existing terminal at Texas City, which has approximately 550,000 m³ ( 3.5 million barrels), of storage capacity for liquid petroleum products, renewables, chemicals and gases.

The storage operator noted that the port of Texas City is home to a large refining and chemical industry, and its short sailing time to open water and uncongested marine traffic make it a “highly valuable” player in the Houston market.