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Air pollution from Harvey was bad. This Houston petrochemical fire is worse.

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The fire blazing at a chemical storage facility in Houston has blanketed the city in smoke, shuttered schools, and released a dangerous mix of pollutants.

According to self-reported emissions data posted on the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s website, the blaze had sent more than 9 million pounds of pollutants into the air by Monday morning. That’s more than the 8.3 million pounds of pollutants released during Harvey in 2017 in a single day.

The toxic mixture includes carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, toluene, and naphtha. That’s self-reported, so there may be even more pollution. The data, for instance, doesn’t include the particulate matter — or soot — spewing in black plumes from the fire.

“Particulate matter is incredibly dangerous,” said Adrian Shelley, director of Public Citizen Texas, a watchdog group. It can cause a range of effects, including asthma, heart attacks, and strokes. “It’s not out of the realm of possibility that this exposure could cause very severe health impacts up to and including death.”

The fire broke out Sunday morning at Intercontinental Terminals Company’s facility in Deer Park, a heavily industrialized area about 15 miles southeast of Houston. ITC, as it’s known, has a long history of flouting environmental rules. According to EPA data, it has violated federal clean water rules nine times in the last three years. Since 2005, the state has found Intercontinental Terminals in violation of its permits at least nine times, resulting in roughly $70,000 in fines.

The TCEQ, the agency responsible for protecting the state’s environment and public health, has been criticized for letting large corporate polluters off with a slap on the wrist. An analysis of its enforcement record by an environmental nonprofit found that the agency imposed penalties on violators in just 3 percent of cases. ITC appears to have benefitted from the lax enforcement. In 2016, for instance, the company released more than 1,500 pounds of benzene — a carcinogenic chemical — for over five days and failed to notify the state agency within the mandated 24-hour deadline. The fine: roughly $4,000.

The state agency and cities have been tracking air quality in the area. In its second press release since the fire broke out, the TCEQ said on Tuesday that particulate matter levels “increased slightly” in the hours after the fire began on Sunday to “moderate levels” but have since dropped.

Air quality data from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality show particulate matter levels spiking in the hours after the fire broke out.Texas Commission on Environmental Quality

That statement is at odds with one the agency released the day before, in which it appeared to downplay the effects of the fire on public health, noting that it “had not detected any immediate health concerns at ground level.” Residents have reported headaches and itchy throats on Twitter and to Texas journalists. And the fire is expected to keep burning for another two days.

All this comes two weeks after the Los Angeles Times reported that the TCEQ turned down NASA’s assistance with air quality monitoring during Harvey.

“TCEQ hasn’t built up a very big trust bank with the public,” said Luke Metzger, executive director at Environment Texas, an Austin-based environmental group. “During Harvey, they downplayed some of the concerns, and it’s hard to say whether they’re being straight with us. I wish I could take them at their word, but it’s hard to know for sure.”

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Air pollution from Harvey was bad. This Houston petrochemical fire is worse.

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Fed-up Chicago residents sue over petcoke ashheaps

Fed-up Chicago residents sue over petcoke ashheaps

Josh Mogerman

Residents of Chicago’s southeast side aren’t going to sit idly by as their city, state and federal governments try to protect them from byproducts of tar-sands oil refining — the black dust that’s been blowing over their homes from nearby petcoke piles. The residents have called in a team of lawyers, and they are going after the companies that produce and store the uncovered piles of carbon powder.

The petcoke is left over after the refining of tar-sands oil, most of which is coming into the Midwest from Canada. Petcoke can’t be legally burned as fuel in the U.S., but subsidiaries of Koch Industries have been buying up the waste across the country anyway, presumably for sale into countries with less strict air pollution laws. And two of the defendants named in the lawsuit are subsidiaries of Koch Industries, including KCBX Terminals, which is storing some of the piles of petcoke along the Calamut River.

Koch isn’t the only familiar name listed as a bad guy in the new lawsuit. BP is also named as a defendant. That’s because much of the problem petcoke is coming from the company’s nearby Whiting refinery, where billions of dollars have been spent to help it process Canadian crude. From a Nov. 15 Bloomberg story:

The 420,000-barrel-a-day Whiting plant brought online a new delayed coker, according to a person familiar with operations at the plant. Combined with a crude unit that started in June, the equipment will allow Whiting to process as much as 85 percent Canadian heavy crude, up from about 20 percent, the company’s website shows. The refinery is scheduled to ramp up heavy oil consumption over a three-month period, the company said in an Oct. 29 presentation.

The Chicago Sun Times reports on the lawsuit:

The suit, filed Monday in federal court, accuses BP, Koch Carbon, KCBX Terminals [another Koch subsidiary], George J. Beemsterboer Inc. and KM Railways of each knowingly and intentionally producing, marketing and selling the chemical mixture of petroleum coke instead of destroying it, with residue coating the homes and property of residents throughout the surrounding South Chicago neighborhood. …

The six-count suit alleges willful and wanton conduct, abnormally dangerous activity, strict liability in tort, trespassing, public nuisance, private nuisance and declaratory relief. The residents are seeking an undisclosed amount in damages.

As the U.S. is flooded with tar-sands oil from the mining boom up north, you can expect this problem will only deepen.


Source
Canada Heavy Oil Gains as BP Refinery Said to Ramp Up New Coker, Bloomberg
Southeast Side residents sue companies over petcoke storage, Chicago Sun-Times

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Fed-up Chicago residents sue over petcoke ashheaps

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