Titan eyes new storage project

Hong Kong-listed oil trader Titan Petrochemicals Group Ltd. said it may build a new storage facility for oil and petrochemical products along China’s coast, to benefit from the country’s robust demand for energy. Titan, which has three storage projects underway in China, is studying several possible sites for its fourth storage facility. Chief Executive Officer Barry Cheung says Titans first storage facility, located in Nansha, Guangdong province, was opened in late October. Apart from Nansha, Titan is building two other storage projects along the Chinese coast, Quanzhou in Fujian and Yangshan near Shanghai. To fund the construction of the existing storage projects and purchasing of bunker barges, Titan plans to earmark an annual capital outlay of about HK$500 million (US$63.98 million) for 2007 and 2008, similar to that in 2006. Titan said it plans to lease up to 75% of its Nansha storage capacity to other oil product suppliers. Phase one of the development has the capacity to store 410,000 cubic meters of fuel oil, while the second phase is designed to store another 1.39 million cubic meters. (January 25, 2007)