Port of Houston

The Port of Houston is one of the busiest ports in the United States by tonnage and the leading U.S. port for foreign waterborne trade, reached not from the open Gulf but along the Houston Ship Channel, a roughly 50-mile dredged waterway that lets ocean ships sail inland to docks deep within the city. Dug in the early 20th century after a devastating hurricane wrecked rival Galveston, the channel turned a shallow bayou town into a global port.

Its banks hold one of the largest concentrations of petrochemical plants and refineries in the world, and the port is the hub of America's energy exports, moving crude oil, refined fuels, plastics, and chemicals in enormous volume. That mix of heavy industry, hurricane risk, and busy ship traffic makes the channel both an economic powerhouse and a closely watched environmental and safety challenge on the Texas Gulf Coast.

• Galveston Bay
  The shallow estuary at the heart of the Houston coast related