US refiner Phillips 66 charters foreign vessel after Jones Act waiver
(Reuters) — Phillips 66 has chartered a Marshall Islands-flagged vessel, making use of a temporary waiver of the Jones Act that was put in place to meet fuel shortages in the wake of hurricanes Harvey and Irma, Argus Media reported on Thursday.
The vessel, Nave Jupiter, departed from Houston, Texas on Sept. 9, and was docked near the company's Alliance refinery in Louisiana, the report said.
The nearly 100-year-old law mandates the use of US-flagged vessels to transport merchandise between US coasts.
Last week, the US Homeland Security Department had waived the law for a week, the first such waiver since December 2012 after Hurricane Sandy.
The department said earlier this week that it was extending the temporary waiver until Sept. 22.
Phillips 66 had requested a waiver to allow it to use foreign vessels to move crude or products to and from its 260,000-bpd Alliance refinery after Hurricane Harvey.
Reporting by Arpan Varghese in Bengaluru; Editing by Biju Dwarakanath
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