(by Paul Vivian and Rick Preckel, www.prestonpipe.com) Market Monitor Projects: Our review of midstream performers – Noble Midstream Partners is one example – indicates that despite a downward trending rig count and announcements of upstream budget cuts, the midstream segment is expecting a growth year. Some of this is related to the expected completion of several pipelines out of the Permian basin and other regions.
A pipeline cycle typically follows a drilling cycle but this dip is expected to be relatively mild and may result in no pipeline cycle at all. Stay tuned. Since November, according to the Simdex Future Pipeline Projects database, 18 new projects have been announced in the U.S. and Canada with an aggregate of 584 miles. Four of these projects are large diameter water pipeline projects. For details on all the Future, Completed, Abandoned, and On Hold pipeline projects around the world, subscribe to the Simdex Future Pipeline Projects Worldwide Guide. Duty orders have been issued in the case of large diameter welded pipe from India and China while the balance of the countries subject to the large diameter trade case await the ITC vote on injury scheduled for early April. In the case of India, the final anti-dumping rate is 16.85% when adjusted for the countervailing offset, while the countervailing duty rate is 541.15%. For China, the anti-dumping rate is 132.63% but from a CVD perspective, the ITC ruled that the volume was negligible so there was no injury to the domestic industry. These cases have been updated in the Trade Case Scoreboard. Import Supply: The December import total is 203,872 tons is a fairly high number for the time of year but it does include some large diameter project tonnage. The January and February licenses are 286,210 tons and 207,471 tons which are historically above average – again, project tons. The forecast for March with 8 of 21 days reporting is 216,300 tons. The big import item for the month of December 2018 is carbon spiral weld over 24” OD at 35,189 tons. The price is $1,055/ton. Obviously project pipe this category had 126,718 tons for the year.