Exporters Gear Up for Panama Expansion

摘要

Long vital to global oil trade, the Panama Canal could soon play a similar role for LNG, particularly for planned exports to Asia from the US. Right now, no LNG carriers use the 80 kilometer (50 mile) waterway, which links the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, because they are too big to pass through the locks. But once an expansion is completed in 2015 adding two new larger sets of locks, 90% of the world's existing LNG fleet will be able to transit, says Silvia Marucci, a spokesperson for the state-run Panama Canal Authority (ACP). The only ones that won't will be Qatar's giant Q-Flex and Q-Max vessels.