refineries | Occupy World Writes

“Such events are an all-too-common and exceptionally dangerous reality for those living within fossil fuel and petrochemical ‘sacrifice zones,'” observed one researcher.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 8-25-2023 by Common Dreams

A massive plume of smoke—visible from outer space—billows from a burning storage tank at Marathon Petroleum’s Garyville, Louisiana refinery on August 25, 2023. (Photo: Mike Friloux/Facebook)

A mandatory evacuation was ordered for thousands of people living within a two-mile radius of a Marathon Petroleum refinery in Louisiana’s so-called “Cancer Alley” after a chemical leak and massive fire broke out at a storage tank there on Friday.

The temporary evacuation order, which Marathon Petroleum called “precautionary,” followed a leak of naphtha—a hazardous and highly flammable liquid hydrocarbon mixture—and blaze at the refinery in Garyville in St. John the Baptist Parish, located about 45 miles upriver from New Orleans.

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337,000 pounds of benzene, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, and sulfur dioxide were flared, as well as an indeterminate amount of methane.

By Brett Wilkins, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 2-22-2021

Flaring at Shell Deer Park Refinery, Deer Park TX. Photo: Roy Luck/flickr/CC

Texas oil refineries released hundreds of thousands of pounds of pollutants including benzene, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, and sulfur dioxide into the air as they scrambled to shut down during last week’s deadly winter storm, Reuters reported Sunday.

Winter storm Uri, which killed dozens of people and cut off power to over four million Texans at its peak, also disrupted supplies needed to keep the state’s refineries and petrochemical plants operating. As they shut down, refineries flared—or burned off—gases in order to prevent damage to their processing units. Continue reading →

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‘No Safe Amount’: Environmentalists Sound Alarm Over Texas Refineries’ Release of Hundreds of Thousands of Pounds of Pollutants During Storm

337,000 pounds of benzene, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, and sulfur dioxide were flared, as well as an indeterminate amount of methane.