Houston — Eight laden coal ships departed from Baltimore in the week ended July 28, up from six in the previous week, according to cFlow, Platts’ trade flow software.

Two of the departures are expected to stop in Norfolk, Virginia, while another is expected to head to Savannah, Georgia.

An additional two ships are destined for Central and South America, with one headed to the Panama Canal and another to Santos, Brazil, expecting to arrive on August 3 and August 9, respectively. The remaining ships are scheduled to arrive in El Dekheila, Egypt, on August 11, the Port of Iskenderun, Turkey, on August 12, and Zeebrugge, Belgium, on August 5, according to cFlow.

EXPECTED ARRIVALS ALSO CLIMB ON WEEK

In the next week, nine coal ships are expected to arrive in Baltimore by August 4, up from eight in the prior week, according to the data.

Only one of the expected nine coal carriers are partially laden, while the remaining eight are unladen. In the previous week, five were unladen and three were laden.

In 2018, Baltimore was the second-largest coal exporting port in the US when it shipped out 19.53 million mt of coal, behind Norfolk, Virginia’s 37.34 million mt, according to US Census Bureau data.

Nearly 52% of the coal shipped out of Baltimore in 2018 was bituminous coal, while the remaining 48% was metallurgical coal. It was the first time in more than seven years that more thermal coal was exported out of Baltimore than metallurgical coal.

Through the first five months of 2019, 5.45 million mt of bituminous coal left Baltimore, up from 4.6 million mt in the same period a year ago. The 5.45 million mt was the most bituminous coal exported from any US port, beating out New Orleans, which exported 4.92 million mt.

In 2018, New Orleans was the top bituminous exporter at 17.5 million mt, while Baltimore exported 10.11 million mt of bituminous coal.

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