A New Trade Route for Natural Gas Opens in Panama

When the Panama Canal’s expanded locks slid open in late June, perhaps no one was happier than executives in the U.S. shale industry. With the goal of making the U.S. a global powerhouse for natural gas exports, these frackers have their sights on Asia. Now they have a more direct route that could significantly benefit their bottom line.

Nine years of construction work at a cost of more than $5 billion have equipped the canal with a third set of locks and deeper navigation channels, crucial improvements that doubled the isthmus’s capacity for ferrying goods between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Within a week of opening, officials said they had more than 170 reservations for transits this year, mostly for so-called New Panamax cargo carriers that couldn’t fit through the old canal.