Kinder Morgan’s renewable diesel (RD) hubs in Southern and Northern California now offer full commercial service. RD is an alternative fuel that allows trucks, trains and any equipment that uses diesel to operate with lower lifecycle emissions.
The new RD hubs transport the fuel from the Los Angeles refinery basin to San Diego and the Inland Empire, and from the San Francisco Bay area to Sacramento, San Jose, and Fresno, using the “most efficient and least carbon intensive method,” the company said. The initial phases of both hubs are “fully subscribed” with customer commitments.
“We are very pleased to be advancing California’s climate goals through our Southern and Northern California RD hubs,” Dax Sanders, Kinder Morgan’s president of products pipelines, said in a news release. “These projects present a significant opportunity to participate in the transition to lower-emissions energy sources of the future, while continuing to provide fuels still in demand today. We are confident that the best way to serve markets during this energy evolution is through an all-of-the-above energy mix.
“Pipelines continue to be the safest and most cost-efficient mode of longhaul transportation for liquid fuels.”
The Southern California hub, which provides a throughput of up to 20,000 barrels per day (bpd) of blended diesel across the two inland destination truck racks, has been delivering RD to San Diego since February, with deliveries to Colton recently commencing. The Southern California hub connects marine supplies of RD coming into the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach to the Los Angeles market via the truck rack at SFPP’s Carson Terminal and to Kinder Morgan’s SFPP pipeline system for delivery to the Inland Empire and San Diego areas.
The Northern California hub, which provides a throughput in aggregate of 21,000 bpd of RD via the SFPP northern pipeline system from the San Francisco Bay area to Kinder Morgan’s Bradshaw, Fresno, and San Jose terminals, is now commencing movement of RD to those markets. Kinder Morgan capitalized on existing infrastructure for the Northern California hub, with potential capacity expansions available in subsequent phases.