For a variety of reasons, maritime commerce and its governing law are incredibly important to Texas. Let’s consider a few reasons why:

Texas Ports

If Texas was its own country (some think that it already is), it would rank as the ninth-largest economy in the world with a GDP of roughly $1.9 trillion. The ports of Texas are an indispensable driver of that economy generating 25% of its GDP while moving more than 600 million tons of foreign and domestic cargo and generating $450 billion in economic value and $7.8 billion in state and local taxes annually. Three Texas ports rank in the top five in total tonnage in the United States: Houston (first), Beaumont (fourth) and Corpus Christi (fifth). The Houston Ship Channel is the busiest waterway in the nation servicing eight public and nearly 200 private terminals while supporting more than 3 million U.S. jobs. In March 2021, Port Houston reported its largest monthly container volume of nearly 300,000 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs). Meanwhile, the Port of Beaumont is the No. 1 strategic military outload port in the nation, and Port Corpus Christi set a new record in June 2021 for the volume of cargo transported in the first six months of 2021 with huge increases in LNG and agricultural commodity exports, not to mention its voluminous crude oil and petroleum product movements. And still Texas has two other major ports, Freeport, which ranks 15th nationally in foreign tonnage handled with more than 900 vessel calls per year and burgeoning multi-modal facility expansion plans, and Brownsville, which serves more than 230 industrial companies, including construction of offshore drilling rigs, ship repair and dismantling, bulk petroleum terminals, grain handling and more.

Lightering Operations