Since December 2018, Argus launched three new South Korean wood pellet assessments

Since December 2018, Argus has launched three new wood pellet price assessments for cargoes delivered to South Korea, reflecting the rapid growth in this market. 

South Korea is the biggest Asian importer of wood pellets and is on track to take delivery of more than 3.3mn t of the product this year, up by over 30pc on last year.

The new prices add to the growing suite of Asian biomass price assessments already published in Argus Biomass Markets, a global weekly report published from London every Wednesday.

The first of the new price assessments is for wood pellets loaded in 20ft containers and priced on a cfr Gwangyang basis. Gwangyang is the main receiving port in South Korea for containers and most wood pellets still enter the country at this point.

The other two new prices provided are wood pellets on a delivered, duty-paid (ddp) Gunsan and ddp Daejeon basis. The ddp price is a constructed price based on the following:

• The Argus assessed cfr Gwangyang price for 20ft containers, which excludes port costs
  
• Published Gwangyang port costs, which include container terminal handling charges, container cleaning fees, wharfage costs and cargo insurance
  
• Published inland trucking charges to Gunsan and Daejeon