Sunoco is now the sole provider of fuel to Logan International Airport, after purchasing an East Boston fuel storage and distribution facility in East Boston.

The Philadelphia, Penn.-based oil corporation will purchase the terminal for $56 million from ConocoPhillips plus the value of the existing inventory, a spokesperson told Banker & Tradesman.

"We are always looking for opportunities to expand our business and it is a nice size terminal in a geographic region where we’re looking to expand," said Thomas Golembeski, director of communications for Sunoco Logistics Partners.

The company takes over the long-term contract for supplying all of Logan airport’s jet fuel and other gas needs, but Golembeski said he did not know when the contract expires. The property can hold 1.2 million barrels of oil and jet fuel, and Sunoco will retain whatever fuel is still on-site. The terminal also functions as a site for tanker trucks to fill-up and deliver the fuel to retail gas stations. Golembeski was unaware if the property comes with any development rights, and was unaware of any expansion plans by Sunoco. He was also unaware of the fuel inventory currently at the terminal.

This is the company’s first foray into a terminal of this size in New England. The closest terminal in New Jersey can hold only half the inventory that the Boston site can accommodate.

The company has about 200 branded gas locations in Massachusetts.

Sunoco owns more than 40 similar terminals around the country, one in Texas that holds about 20 million barrels of crude oil at any given time. Sunoco was forced to shut down a 142,000-barrel-a-day pipeline linking Ohio to Michigan in 2009 after an oil spill at the line’s pump station in Cygnet, Ohio.