Re-Look At "Y Grade" Out Of The Bakken -- January 6, 2018

The other day a reader updated the spot price of "Y grade" products:

 Today's spot pricing at Belvieu, expressed in barrels ...

• Ethane ~$11/bbl.
• Propane ~ $40/bbl
• Butane ~ $42/bbl
• Pentanes ~ $58/bbl

There have been many, many posts on "Y grade" products. Some of them, based on "relevance":

• update on EPD's fractionating facilities around Houston, TX; NGL fundamentals
• the Bakken natural gas story gets bigger and bigger
• Marcellus midstream, RBN Energy
• the road to New England, Forbes, an update

Also, from the FAQ page:

58. Oil is generally "measured" in barrels (bbls). Is the volume of natural gas liquid (NGL) ("wet" natural gas) also expressed in bbls? No, NGLs are generally expressed in gallons, according to a comment sent in by a chemical engineer.  Incidentally, some think the "additional" "b" comes from "blue barrels." From RBN Energy:

There’s one more aspect of NGL markets that must have been designed to confuse outsiders, because it certainly does.  NGL quantities are quoted in barrels.  NGL prices are quoted in gallons.  Really.  So I’ll sell you 10,000 barrels of non-TET normal butane for $1.36 per gallon.  It never occurs to NGL people to convert either the quantity to gallons or the price to a per barrel number.  They think of everything multiplied by or divided by 42.  Go figure.  And BTW, propane retail people do think in gallons - but that’s another story.