Unintended consequences of the Jones Act… New Boston Post

The NewBostonPost has a nice piece on the difficulty of moving LNG into Boston and New England due to Jones Act restrictions, here…

”Even though liquefied natural gas is produced fairly cheaply in the United States, the New England region has to get its shipments from Trinidad and Tobago because of a 1920 federal law called the Jones Act that prohibits the transportation of any cargo between U.S. ports unless the ship was built in the country and is owned by U.S. citizens.”

”The issue is magnified with regards to natural gas because the U.S. has cheap and plentiful natural gas, but no Jones Act-qualified carriers. Accordingly, Massachusetts imports LNG from Trinidad and Tobago, while U.S. gas is sent overseas on foreign-flagged ships,” the office wrote. “When pipeline natural gas supply is constrained, the lack of a fleet of Jones Act qualified tankers means a bigger price spike due to the need to import LNG from foreign ports.”

So the Baker administration, with the support of the rest of the New England governors, is planning to try “working with federal officials to explore modifying the Jones Act to facilitate shipping of LNG from domestic sources,” Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources commissioner Judith Judson said last week.”