Port of Vancouver Discussion

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by AverageJoe

The coal shipped out of Neptune Terminals in North Vancouver is higher-grade, low-sulphur bituminous coking coal used for steel production overseas.

Coal shipped out of Westshore Terminals (Deltaport coal facility) and the soon-to-be Fraser Surrey Docks is mostly lower-grade sub-bituminous American coal from the Powder River Basin in Wyoming used predominately for electricity generation. It's sent by the BNSF Railway to BC for export.

Incorrect. Neptune Terminals is relatively small (in terms of metallurgical coal shipments) in comparison to Roberts Bank (Westshore Terminals), which is the largest metallurgical coal-loading facility on the west coast of North America IIRC.

Most of SE BC`s metallurgical coal production is shipped through Roberts Bank to Asia. As a matter of fact, the Roberts Bank coal terminal was constructed as well as opened in 1970 in order to service the then new large-scale metallurgical coal mines that opened up in the Elkford Valley in SE BC. (Kaiser Resources and Fording Coal back then IIRC).

Roberts Bank also does ship some thermal coal from the U.S. Powder River Basin but that has always represented a small portion of overall coal shipments thereto. And with major Powder River Basin thermal coal producer Cloud Peak Energy suspending 4 million tons per annum shipments through Westshore Terminals, I suspect that thermal coal exports will virtually grind to a halt thereto.

BTW, the Ridley Island coal terminal up in Prince Rupert was constructed back in the early 1980`s in order to ship NE BC metallurgical coal. Recently, coal mine production suspensions in NE BC (due to declining metallurgical coal prices in this instance) has seen Ridley Island volumes or throughput decrease considerably as well.

[Bcasey25raptor]

Speaking of Natural gas, what do you think will become of BC's plans to export LNG?

Will any be shipped right out of Port Metro Vancouver?

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by Bcasey25raptor

Speaking of Natural gas, what do you think will become of BC's plans to export LNG?

Will any be shipped right out of Port Metro Vancouver?

Alot of pipedream or promoter dreams in terms of LNG shipped outta Metro Vancouver (including the recent Tsawwassen FN proposal).

That said, only 2 LNG proposals in the overall region make economic sense and have a 50%+ chance of moving forward with FID. BTW, these 2 proposals are both quite small (in comparison to the proposed NW BC behemoths) and are also different LNG `tolling models` (compared to the vertically integrated models in NW BC). Another discussion altogether.

I dunno if these 2 LNG proposals are even under the jurisdiction of the Port of Vancouver but they are:

1. Woodfibre LNG in Squamish; (Has recently received BCEAO enviro certification as well as Squamish FN `enviro certification`. Has also recently signed a general memorandum of agreement with Beijing Gas Group Co. in China for a final off-take agreement);

2. WesPac Tilbury LNG - involves a marine jetty along the Fraser River in Delta adjacent to Fortis BC`s existing LNG tank (used for NG storage). Apparently have a 500,000 ton per annum off-take arrangement with Hawaiian Electric.

Again, two relatively puny LNG proposals in the Lower Mainland that may have a chance of getting off the ground. Right now I can see Woodfibre LNG issuing FID before the end of 2016. But who knows. Again, a completely different LNG business model compared to the global energy LNG giants vertically-integrated proposals in NW BC.

PS. As for NW BC in terms of LNG? FWIW, here is what I posted yesterday in another unrelated thread:

When (not if) the $US 36 billion Petronas LNG consortium receives its CEAA enviro certification late February, 2016 (they have already signed off on FID subject to same) and when (not if) the $US 40 billion Royal Dutch Shell LNG consortium announces its FID by June, 2016 (yes really), employment in BC will explode from trades in interior BC to professional services in downtown Van City.

Just one of these LNG projects alone would be considered the world`s largest industrial project (akin to China`s Three Gorges Dam, the Panama Canal Expansion and the massive Milan-Bologna high-speed railway combined into one). Gonna be great times movin` forward here in BC. No doubt about that.

[SOSS]

This article came out in June of 2013:

Says James Corbett, professor of marine policy at the University of Delaware: “Ship pollution affects the health of communities in coastal and inland regions around the world, yet pollution from ships remains one of the least regulated parts of our global transportation system.” It sounds serious, but how bad could it be? Staggeringly, if a report by the UK’s Guardian newspaper is to be believed. According to their story, just one of the world’s largest container ships can emit about as much pollution as 50 million cars. Further, the 15 largest ships in the world emit as much nitrogen oxide and sulphur oxide as the world’s 760 million cars.

The problem isn’t necessarily with the ships’ 109,000-horsepower engines that endlessly spin away 24 hours a day, 280 days a year. In fact, these powerplants are some of the most fuel efficient units in the world. The real issue lies with the heavy fuel oil the ships run on and the almost complete lack of regulations applied to the giant exhaust stacks of these container ships.

The good news is that pressure is building from various governments around the world, including the United States, which just recently introduced legislation to keep these ships at least 230 miles away from U.S. coastlines. Similar measures are likely to follow in other countries like the United Kingdom.

link

These numbers are staggering. I don't know where various governments are at with keeping these ships 230 miles off the coastline - and I question how valuable the ship is if it can't unload at port. But its an interesting study that could use some updating.

[tybuilding]

To me it is pretty stupid that the port of Vancouver approved a coal port expansion to deliver more coal to an area of the world that suffers from extreme pollution levels, much of which is caused from the burning of coal, more coal to a world that is carbon constrained and out of a city that doesn't want this expansion (Surrey) and at a time of really low coal prices. The approval comes at the same time as the COP21 talks in Paris. What are they thinking and have they no morals? T

[casper]

Originally Posted by SOSS

This article came out in June of 2013:



link

These numbers are staggering. I don't know where various governments are at with keeping these ships 230 miles off the coastline - and I question how valuable the ship is if it can't unload at port. But its an interesting study that could use some updating.

I don't know about container ships. Cruise ships normally burn bunker fuel while at sea. When they come closer to port they switch to cleaner fuel. In some ports such as Vancouver when docked they switch to group power.

[jlousa]

I believe you mean shore power, and not group power. The rest of your post is correct. There was worries that the inside passage would get hit hard as they would always have to be burning the more expensive fuel and be at an unfair disadvantage against other cruise routes that can burn bunker fuel. Turns out the incremental costs weren't enough to hurt the industry.
Of course if we could get the leaders on a global scale to agree to better fuel standards across the board the costs would come down and we'd see major benefits on a global scale.

I remember reading a paper about coal power plants a few years ago that crunched the numbers and showed that the environment would benefit if everyone switched to electric cars even if they were powered by coal plants. The efficiency of coal plants puts the internal combustion engine to shame and there would be less pollution from a few plants as opposed to millions of cars. It is also easier to upgrade the pollution controls on a plant instead of lots of individual cars. Scrubbers have come a long way in the last decade as well. While not as ideal as greener sources, coal today doesn't need to be quite the issue it used to be.

[Bcasey25raptor]

Originally Posted by Stingray2004

Alot of pipedream or promoter dreams in terms of LNG shipped outta Metro Vancouver (including the recent Tsawwassen FN proposal).

That said, only 2 LNG proposals in the overall region make economic sense and have a 50%+ chance of moving forward with FID. BTW, these 2 proposals are both quite small (in comparison to the proposed NW BC behemoths) and are also different LNG `tolling models` (compared to the vertically integrated models in NW BC). Another discussion altogether.

I dunno if these 2 LNG proposals are even under the jurisdiction of the Port of Vancouver but they are:

1. Woodfibre LNG in Squamish; (Has recently received BCEAO enviro certification as well as Squamish FN `enviro certification`. Has also recently signed a general memorandum of agreement with Beijing Gas Group Co. in China for a final off-take agreement);

2. WesPac Tilbury LNG - involves a marine jetty along the Fraser River in Delta adjacent to Fortis BC`s existing LNG tank (used for NG storage). Apparently have a 500,000 ton per annum off-take arrangement with Hawaiian Electric.

Again, two relatively puny LNG proposals in the Lower Mainland that may have a chance of getting off the ground. Right now I can see Woodfibre LNG issuing FID before the end of 2016. But who knows. Again, a completely different LNG business model compared to the global energy LNG giants vertically-integrated proposals in NW BC.

PS. As for NW BC in terms of LNG? FWIW, here is what I posted yesterday in another unrelated thread:

All in all, this is fantastic news. Unfortunately however half of my friends are vehemently opposed to the LNG industry. Seems to me that millennials just don't think these things through.

[GMasterAres]

Originally Posted by SOSS

I never said to stop mining all resources. I said to stop the mining and exporting of thermal coal. This coal is specifically used for coal fire power plants. Not used in manufacturing of steel or other products.

You did actually. Re-read your sentance. Grammatically it states you are against mining period. If you meant mining of thermal coal your sentence should have read:

A big way we can do this is to stop mining and shipments of thermal coal.

instead of:

A big way we can do this is to stop mining and no longer allow shipments of thermal coal.

Sorry getting off a tangent but trying to help reduce the amount of forum wars we see around the Interweb. Your sentence above breaks down actually into two sentences:

A big way we can do this is to stop mining.
A big way we can do this is to no longer allow shipments of thermal coal.

Thus why people read it as you were against mining.

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by jlousa

I remember reading a paper about coal power plants a few years ago that crunched the numbers and showed that the environment would benefit if everyone switched to electric cars even if they were powered by coal plants. The efficiency of coal plants puts the internal combustion engine to shame and there would be less pollution from a few plants as opposed to millions of cars. It is also easier to upgrade the pollution controls on a plant instead of lots of individual cars. Scrubbers have come a long way in the last decade as well. While not as ideal as greener sources, coal today doesn't need to be quite the issue it used to be.

Funny. Read today that another ~1,500 thermal-coal powered electrical generation plants are either planned or under construction across the globe - esp. in locales such as China, India, etc.

While scrubbers are quite expensive and can reduce pollution effects from thermal coal electricity plants... these countries such as China and India don't seem to implement same due to cost reasons. Just look at the dangerous levels of pollution in Beijing and other Chinese cities these days.

More importantly, GHG emissions are not captured by scrubbers. Only carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) can capture that. But such tech is not only experimental but waaaay more expensive than scrubbers. BTW, CCS is in the experimental stage in both AB and SK but typically almost at provincial taxpayer expense thereto - $billions.

Here's the comparison of a typical natural-gas generating electrical plant v. one powered by thermal coal in terms of GHG emissions and pollutants:



Makes quite a difference.

On another note, electric vehicles have been a bit of a novelty over the past few years... but even I am beginning to take note of same. When Consumer Reports came out with their recent rating on Tesla as their highest rated vehicle ever... over the 100 scale... I thought wow!

Right now, 1/5 new vehicles sold in Norway are electric-powered. California, with high emission standards sees 40% of all U.S. electric vehicles sold in that state alone. Methinks, EVs sales in NA will skyrocket over the next 1 - 2 decades, which will obviously reduce the demand for oil/gasoline and, in turn, reduce GHGs.

On a final note - "green energy". I am all for same but let's face it... only "firm" baseload electrical generation such as hydro-electric dams, nuclear, natural gas, and thermal coal can operate ~100% of the time.

While wind power is an excellent source of energy, ya gotta remember that can only be utilized as an auxiliary electrical source. Why? Most wind farms (aside from installed capacity) only operate 18% - 19% of the time (40% maximum for premium wind sites). Even then, wind is stronger during night-time periods when electrical demand is lower.

And solar power is also an excellent source of energy. But, again, ya gotta remember that right here in BC we have many cloudy/rainy days and during the winter months fewer sunlight hours as well as indirect sunlight majorly impacts electrical generation.

During cold winter months is when BC has peak annual periods of electrical usage. If we only relied upon "intermittent" wind and solar energy, we would be hooped in terms of major brownouts/blackouts.

While we are obviously off-topic... still an interesting convo!

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by Bcasey25raptor

All in all, this is fantastic news. Unfortunately however half of my friends are vehemently opposed to the LNG industry. Seems to me that millennials just don't think these things through.

Frankly, most folk in BC don't even understand LNG. It's just some abstract concept.

Heck, the AB oil sands is a major user of BC nat gas in order to heat up same. We have the Spectra Energy (former Westcoast Transmission) natural gas mainline to SW BC supplying both BC, the U.S. Pacific Northwest, and Cali.

The most low-carbon and relatively clean fossil fuel. Why not ship same to Asia via the "LNG pipeline"?

Again, just one of the global energy giant's LNG proposals for NW BC would be equivalent to building China's massive Three Gorges Dam, the recent Panama Canal expansion as well as the huge Milan-Bologna high-speed railway - ALL combined into one.

We are talking about ~5,000 - 6,000 employed at a coast LNG plant during "peak" construction, another ~1,500 -~2,000 for NG pipeline construction from NE BC to NW BC... over a ~5-year period. Plus major NE BC natural gas drilling, local pipeline expansion and new nat gas processing plants in NE BC. With major long-term employment as well.

Again, that's the impact of just one of the major LNG proposals.

The likely LNG majors to proceed in NW BC with commencement dates as well as "final" build-out capacity in order:

1. Petronas consortium - 2016 - 18 million tons/annum; (BTW, in today's Sydney Morning Herald even the most "bearish" on LNG globally concedes this project is moving forward)

2. Royal Dutch Shell consortium - 2016 - 24 million tons per annum;

3. ExxonMobil/Imperial Oil - 2018 - 2020 - 30 million tons per annum;

4. Nexen Consortium (CNOOC/Inpex/JGC) - 2018 - 2020 - 12 million tons per annum;

5. Chevron/Woodside Energy - 2018 - 2020 - 10 million tons per annum;

Again, all LNG proponents will have initial liquefaction trains with additional "brownfield" capacity to be added later. If all of these eventually proceed, at full combined build-out capacity of 94 million tons per annum...

... then each 10 million tons per annum capacity would equate to roughly $1 billion per annum into BC provincial coffers eventually. Multiply same by ~9.4 or roughly $10 billion per annum into BC provincial coffers. Pays for infrastructure, health care, education, etc. without going into further debt/deficits or raise taxes. What's not to like?!

Certainly a very complex global industry, which I have acutely followed since 2011 and, frankly, difficult for most to separate the chaff from the wheat.

[Alex Mackinnon]

Originally Posted by AverageJoe

The coal shipped out of Neptune Terminals in North Vancouver is higher-grade, low-sulphur bituminous coking coal used for steel production overseas.

Coal shipped out of Westshore Terminals (Deltaport coal facility) and the soon-to-be Fraser Surrey Docks is mostly lower-grade sub-bituminous American coal from the Powder River Basin in Wyoming used predominately for electricity generation. It's sent by the BNSF Railway to BC for export.

By volume there's way more metallugical coal exported. All of the coal coming from Northern and Eastern BC is metallurgical. When you watch the trains rolling through Kamloops, most of the ones that aren't hauling potash are carrying metallurgical coal bound for Vancouver. It's a huge volume. BNSF I think had 1 or 2 trains per day hauling thermal coal?

Granted, Teck (who owns most of the mines) isn't having a good time right now, and some mines are cutting production. The thermal coal however is in what is probably a terminal decline. The thermal coal soon isn't going to be worth the price of the shipping.

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by Stingray2004

Incorrect. Neptune Terminals is relatively small (in terms of metallurgical coal shipments) in comparison to Roberts Bank (Westshore Terminals), which is the largest metallurgical coal-loading facility on the west coast of North America IIRC.

Most of SE BC`s metallurgical coal production is shipped through Roberts Bank to Asia. As a matter of fact, the Roberts Bank coal terminal was constructed as well as opened in 1970 in order to service the then new large-scale metallurgical coal mines that opened up in the Elkford Valley in SE BC. (Kaiser Resources and Fording Coal back then IIRC).

Roberts Bank also does ship some thermal coal from the U.S. Powder River Basin but that has always represented a small portion of overall coal shipments thereto. And with major Powder River Basin thermal coal producer Cloud Peak Energy suspending 4 million tons per annum shipments through Westshore Terminals, I suspect that thermal coal exports will virtually grind to a halt thereto.

BTW, the Ridley Island coal terminal up in Prince Rupert was constructed back in the early 1980`s in order to ship NE BC metallurgical coal. Recently, coal mine production suspensions in NE BC (due to declining metallurgical coal prices in this instance) has seen Ridley Island volumes or throughput decrease considerably as well.

The coal shipped through Fraser Surrey Docks (which is what spurred the recent activity in this thread) is thermal coal mined in the US, transported to Canada, then shipped to Asia. It's not metallurgical, and it's not mined in BC. [source]

[Jebby]

Originally Posted by Stingray2004

On another note, electric vehicles have been a bit of a novelty over the past few years... but even I am beginning to take note of same. When Consumer Reports came out with their recent rating on Tesla as their highest rated vehicle ever... over the 100 scale... I thought wow!\

That rating has been revised. Consumer Reports now gives Tesla a "not recommended" rating.

http://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars...n-reliability/

[Alex Mackinnon]

Originally Posted by Jebby

That rating has been revised. Consumer Reports now gives Tesla a "not recommended" rating.

http://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars...n-reliability/

Volt reliability has been pretty good. Sorry for the aside mods.

[jlousa]

This one has been in the works for over a decade, it was already on the drawing board when I worked there a lifetime ago. Port Metro Vancouver is in a major expansion mode.

The proposed Centerm Expansion Project is a series of improvements to increase the number of containers that can be handled at the existing terminal by approximately two-thirds. These proposed improvements include an expansion of the terminal area, reconfiguration of the terminal, and road and rail access improvements. Port Metro Vancouver’s Centerm Expansion Project team is working with DP World Vancouver to develop the project.

[urbancanadian]

Thanks! Good to see this moving forward. What exactly are you quoting? I'd be interested in seeing more info.

Also, a small nitpick... could we change the title of the thread to "Port Metro Vancouver Discussion"?

EDIT
Here's a brief overview from December 8, 2015: http://www.portmetrovancouver.com/wp...t-Overview.pdf

[wrenegade]

New grain terminal proposed at the current Lynnterm Westbank facility.

http://www.nsnews.com/news/g3-grain-...uver-1.2159564

[Pinion]

In the past I would've assumed it was just NIMBYism but after walking past the terminals (once, because I would never do it again) I can totally understand the noise complaints.

Although that location is more appropriate than Moodyville.

[Metro-One]

It always amazes me at how many areas in Metro-Vancouver fight against the primary industry that keeps the local economy healthy.