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Valuation of Storage at a Liquefied Natural Gas Terminal

Author

Listed:
  • Guoming Lai

    (McCombs School of Business, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712)

  • Mulan X. Wang

    (DTE Energy Trading, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104)

  • Sunder Kekre

    (Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213)

  • Alan Scheller-Wolf

    (Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213)

  • Nicola Secomandi

    (Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213)

Abstract

The valuation of the real option to store liquefied natural gas (LNG) at the downstream terminal of an LNG value chain is an important problem in practice. Because the exact valuation of this real option is computationally intractable, we develop a novel and tractable heuristic model for its strategic valuation that integrates models of LNG shipping, natural gas price evolution, and inventory control and sale into the wholesale natural gas market. We incorporate real and estimated data to quantify the value of this real option and its dependence on the throughput of an LNG chain, the type of price variability, the type of inventory control policy employed, and the level of stochastic variability in both the shipping model and the natural gas price model used. In addition, we develop an imperfect information dual upper bound to assess the effectiveness of our heuristic and find that our method is near optimal. Our approach also has potential relevance to value the real option to store other commodities in facilities located downstream from a commodity production or transportation stage, such as petroleum and agricultural products, chemicals, and metals, or the real option to store the input used in the production of a commodity such as electricity.

Suggested Citation

  • Guoming Lai & Mulan X. Wang & Sunder Kekre & Alan Scheller-Wolf & Nicola Secomandi, 2011. "Valuation of Storage at a Liquefied Natural Gas Terminal," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 59(3), pages 602-616, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:oropre:v:59:y:2011:i:3:p:602-616
    DOI: 10.1287/opre.1100.0909
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Nicola Secomandi, 2015. "Merchant Commodity Storage Practice Revisited," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 63(5), pages 1131-1143, October.
    2. Ruimeng Hu & Mike Ludkovski, 2015. "Sequential Design for Ranking Response Surfaces," Papers 1509.00980, arXiv.org, revised Jul 2016.
    3. Anna Maria Gambaro & Nicola Secomandi, 2021. "A Discussion of Non‐Gaussian Price Processes for Energy and Commodity Operations," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(1), pages 47-67, January.
    4. Nicola Secomandi & Guoming Lai & François Margot & Alan Scheller-Wolf & Duane J. Seppi, 2015. "Merchant Commodity Storage and Term-Structure Model Error," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 17(3), pages 302-320, July.
    5. Ankur Goel & Genaro J. Gutierrez, 2011. "Multiechelon Procurement and Distribution Policies for Traded Commodities," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(12), pages 2228-2244, December.
    6. Arvesen, Ø. & Medbø, V. & Fleten, S.-E. & Tomasgard, A. & Westgaard, S., 2013. "Linepack storage valuation under price uncertainty," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 155-164.
    7. Thompson, Matt, 2016. "Natural gas storage valuation, optimization, market and credit risk management," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 26-44.
    8. John R. Birge, 2015. "OM Forum—Operations and Finance Interactions," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 17(1), pages 4-15, February.
    9. Liu, Baoli & Li, Zhi-Chun & Wang, Yadong, 2023. "A branch-and-price heuristic algorithm for the bunkering operation problem of a liquefied natural gas bunkering station in the inland waterways," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 145-170.
    10. Ruimeng Hu, 2019. "Deep Learning for Ranking Response Surfaces with Applications to Optimal Stopping Problems," Papers 1901.03478, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2020.
    11. Nicola Secomandi & Sunder Kekre, 2014. "Optimal Energy Procurement in Spot and Forward Markets," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 16(2), pages 270-282, May.
    12. Charis Ntakolia & Michalis Douloumpekis & Christos Papaleonidas & Violetta Tsiampa & Dimitrios V. Lyridis, 2023. "A Stochastic Modelling and Optimization for the Design of an LNG Refuelling System in the Piraeus Port Region," SN Operations Research Forum, Springer, vol. 4(3), pages 1-32, September.
    13. Chen, Siyuan & Zhang, Qi & Wang, Ge & Zhu, Lijing & Li, Yan, 2018. "Investment strategy for underground gas storage facilities based on real option model considering gas market reform in China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 132-142.
    14. Onur Boyabatlı & Jason Nguyen & Tong Wang, 2017. "Capacity Management in Agricultural Commodity Processing and Application in the Palm Industry," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 19(4), pages 551-567, October.
    15. Trigeorgis, Lenos & Tsekrekos, Andrianos E., 2018. "Real Options in Operations Research: A Review," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 270(1), pages 1-24.
    16. Stefansdottir, Bryndis & Depping, Verena & Grunow, Martin & Kulozik, Ulrich, 2018. "Impact of shelf life on the trade-off between economic and environmental objectives: A dairy case," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 201(C), pages 136-148.
    17. Yangfang (Helen) Zhou & Alan Scheller‐Wolf & Nicola Secomandi & Stephen Smith, 2019. "Managing Wind‐Based Electricity Generation in the Presence of Storage and Transmission Capacity," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 28(4), pages 970-989, April.
    18. Nadarajah, Selvaprabu & Secomandi, Nicola, 2023. "A review of the operations literature on real options in energy," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 309(2), pages 469-487.
    19. Liu, Haomin & Zhang, Zaixu & Zhang, Tao, 2022. "Shale gas investment decision-making: Green and efficient development under market, technology and environment uncertainties," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 306(PA).
    20. Adrian Werner, Kristin Tolstad Uggen, Marte Fodstad, Arnt-Gunnar Lium, and Ruud Egging, 2014. "Stochastic Mixed-Integer Programming for Integrated Portfolio Planning in the LNG Supply Chain," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 1).
    21. A. Lust & K.-H. Waldmann, 2019. "A general storage model with applications to energy systems," OR Spectrum: Quantitative Approaches in Management, Springer;Gesellschaft für Operations Research e.V., vol. 41(1), pages 71-97, March.
    22. Owen Q. Wu & Derek D. Wang & Zhenwei Qin, 2012. "Seasonal Energy Storage Operations with Limited Flexibility: The Price-Adjusted Rolling Intrinsic Policy," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 14(3), pages 455-471, July.
    23. Zhen, Zaili & Lou, Liyun & Tian, Lixin & Gao, Qibing, 2018. "Investment optimization path of NG power generation in China based on carbon value realization and market linkage," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 241-255.
    24. Daniel R. Jiang & Lina Al-Kanj & Warren B. Powell, 2020. "Optimistic Monte Carlo Tree Search with Sampled Information Relaxation Dual Bounds," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 68(6), pages 1678-1697, November.
    25. Sripad K. Devalkar & Ravi Anupindi & Amitabh Sinha, 2011. "Integrated Optimization of Procurement, Processing, and Trade of Commodities," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 59(6), pages 1369-1381, December.

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