Friday, October 08, 2021

#ECOCIDE UPDATED
Marathon Galveston Bay Refinery leak stops, but road closures remain in Texas City

KTRK 13 hrs ago

A tank at a Texas City refinery that was spewing crude oil has stopped leaking, officials said Thursday.

However, the Texas City Office of Emergency Management said Loop 197 next to the Marathon Galveston Bay Refinery is expected to remain closed for the next two days as clean-up gets underway.

Officials add all spilled crude oil was contained on site and is being removed and properly treated.

The leak began Wednesday morning, and it was blamed on the failure of a pump seal at the facility, according to Bruce Clawson, interim director of Homeland Security for Texas City. No injuries were reported.

The Marathon Galveston Bay Refinery has a refining capacity of 593,000 barrels of oil per day, according to company documents.

It wasn't clear how much oil had spilled. Video from SkyEye showed a large amount of fluid spewing from a large tank at the site Wednesday.

"The refinery has deployed air monitoring in the community as a precaution, and there is no indication of risk to the community," Marathon Petroleum Corporation communications manager Jamal Kheiry said in a statement.

Kheiry also said an investigation is planned to determine what caused the spill.

Marathon Texas Refinery Works to Contain Day-Old Oil Leak

Barbara Powell and Sergio Chapa
Thu., October 7, 2021, 10:08 a.m.·


(Bloomberg) -- Marathon Petroleum Corp.’s huge oil refinery on the Texas Gulf Coast continues to try to contain a crude leak more than 24 hours after crude began gushing from a storage tank on site, a regulatory filing from the company showed.

The crude release at the Galveston Bay facility in Texas City began early Wednesday after a valve flange on the tank failed and oil began pouring into the tank’s containment dike, the filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality showed. Marathon is emptying the tank as quickly as possible to minimize pollution. The company said there were no injuries.

Energy research and consultancy firm Wood Mackenzie estimated the crude tank’s capacity is 400,000 barrels. Marathon declined to discuss the size of the tank.

The leak at the 593,000 barrel-a-day refinery is being contained within an earth dike and foam is being applied to reduce vapors. Equipment to remove the oil for processing and disposal is being deployed. Cleanup is underway and the crude spill remains on-site.

Crude oil released from the storage tank remains contained on-site, and there has been “no indication of risk to the community,” spokesman Jamal T. Kheiry said in an emailed statement on Thursday. The company still doesn’t have an estimate on how much oil has been lost, he added.

Shares of Marathon, the largest independent U.S. refiner, rose as much as 2.4% at 11:56 a.m. in New York.

The incident started at 7:30 a.m. local time on Wednesday and is expected to be over by 7:30 p.m. Thursday, the filing showed. It estimated the leakage at 5,000 pounds of volatile organic compounds.

A road running by the site was closed because of odors emanating from the spill, Bruce Clawson, emergency manager for Texas City, said Wednesday.

Video Shows Oil Gushing Out of Gaping Hole in Texas Refinery



Khaleda Rahman 
 17 hrs ago

A video has been released showing crude oil gushing from a giant storage tank after a leak at the second-largest refinery in the U.S.
© Go Nakamura/Getty Images A road is closed after an oil leak at Marathon Galveston Bay Refinery on October 6, 2021 in Texas City, Texas.

The leak was reported at Marathon Petroleum's Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas City, Texas, on Wednesday morning.

Aerial video broadcast by local television stations showed what appeared to be gallons of brown crude oil spilling from the tank at the 593,000-barrel-a-day refinery, filling an earthen berm that is designed to contain spills.

VIDEO: A crude oil leak at the Marathon Petroleum refinery in Texas City has prompted road closures in the area, officials say. Stay tuned to KPRC 2 as the story develops: KPRC 2 Houston (@KPRC2) October 6, 2021


The Texas City Emergency Management Department closed roads near the refinery to all but essential traffic on Wednesday in response to the leak, according to Click2Houston.

The department reported that the tank had stopped leaking by early Thursday, but said roadways would remain close as clean-up efforts continue.

"The crude oil tank has stopped leaking," the department said in a Twitter post. "However, the south loop remains closed and will remain closed for the next two days while crews clean up the site."

The tweet added: "All spilled crude oil was contained on the site and will be removed, properly treated and the roadway safely reopened."

Joe Gannon, a spokesperson for Marathon Petroleum, told Newsweek that all spilled oil had been contained on-site and there appears to be no risk to the public.

"In response to a crude oil release from one of its Galveston Bay refinery storage tanks yesterday, October 6, Marathon Petroleum personnel implemented measures to control the source of the release and have begun to conduct cleanup activities," Gannon said in a statement. "There have been no injuries, and crude oil released from the storage tank remains contained on-site."

If you have any questions regarding this incident please contact Marathon at 419-421-3577.— City of Texas City Emergency Management (@CityofTC_EM) October 7, 2021


Gannon said the refinery "deployed air monitoring in the community as a precaution, and the monitoring continues," but added that "there has been no indication of risk to the community."

The company does not yet have an estimate on how much oil was leaked, Gannon said.

He added: "Regulatory notifications were made and an investigation will be conducted to determine the cause of the release. The safety of our employees, responders, and the community is our top priority as we respond to the release, conduct cleanup activities, and continue to coordinate with local, state, and federal regulatory officials."

According to a regulatory filing from the company with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the leak was caused by a failure of a valve flange, Bloomberg reported.

The filing estimated the leakage at 5,000 pounds of volatile organic compounds.


No comments:

Post a Comment