Deadly Washington blast is latest refinery accident

More news from yesterday and further proof that the inherent risks of natural gas development are numerous.

Los Angeles Times
By Kim Murphy
April 3, 2010

Reporting from Seattle - Four workers were killed and three others critically burned Friday when an explosion tore through a Tesoro oil refinery in Anacortes, Wash., the latest in a series of troubling refinery accidents that have touched off a nationwide inquiry.

"We're very concerned," said Daniel Horowitz, spokesman for the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, which is dispatching an investigative team to the scene of the accident 70 miles north of Seattle.

"Our agency investigates only the most serious oil and chemical accidents across the country. We have 18 open cases, including this one, and nearly half of them are at oil refineries," he said.

Tesoro, which was fined last year by the Washington Department of Labor and Industries for a series of safety and health violations at the plant, said the cause of the early-morning explosion and fire was still under investigation.

The refinery, part of a large complex in upper Puget Sound, processes about 120,000 barrels of oil a day into gasoline, jet fuel and diesel for markets in Washington and Oregon. It also sells liquefied petroleum gas and asphalt.

Refinery officials said the accident happened around 12:30 a.m. Friday during the dangerous process of restarting the unit's naphtha unit after maintenance. Naphtha is a volatile hydrocarbon mixture that is often used as feedstock for producing high-octane gasoline.

The explosion shook the entire area around the refinery complex and sent flames towering more than 100 feet in the air, according to witnesses.

"My whole house shook like an earthquake. The windows rattled, and I looked over at the refineries, and you could see big flames coming out," said Lisa Wooding, who lives about a mile away. "There was black smoke, and what appeared to be like red embers in the air."

Tina Smith, another nearby resident, said her house also shook. "We thought it was a sonic boom, because the Navy flies over a lot. But then we heard a really loud whooshing sound, and then we heard the sirens over at the refinery going off."

One woman died of burn injuries at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, and three other employees, a woman and two men, remained in critical condition with burns over most of their bodies. More>>>

New Regulations Will Put an End to Mountaintop Mining

Mountaintop coal mining operation in WPhotograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images) est Virginia.
Obama administration proposals will make destructive mountaintop mining operations effectively impossible
by Suzanne Goldenberg

The Obama administration effectively called time Thursday on one of the most destructive industries in America, proposing new environmental guidelines for mountaintop mining removal.

(The move was seen as a bold action from the White House, which has in the past disappointed environmental organisations for failing to move more aggressively on pollution and climate change.

But in a conference call with journalists, just an hour after the administration for the first time finalised regulations setting limits on greenhouse gas emissions from cars, officials spelled out guidelines that they acknowledged would make it virtually impossible for mining companies in Appalachia to carry on with business as usual.

The economics of mountaintop mining removal involve a highly destructive practice of blasting through hundreds of feet of mountaintop to get at thin but valuable seams of coal. The debris is removed to "valley fills", and nearly 2,000 miles of streams in Appalachia have been buried beneath such fills.

In recent years, opposition to the practice has spread from local activists to celebrities, with Robert Kennedy Jr and Darryl Hannah demanding an end to the method.

Lisa Jackson, the head of the Enviromental Protection Agency, said today it is unlikely that valley fills would meet the new standards. "You are talking about either no or very few valley fills that are going to be able to meet standards like this," she said. "What the science is telling us is that it would be untrue to say you can have any more than minimal valley fill and not see irreversible damage to stream health."

Jackson said the new guidelines were not intended to end coal mining. But she admitted it would be hard work for mining companies to meet the new standard. More>>>

Residents reported gas odors before explosion

This is article is a couple of days old, but it goes to prove that, while we give hydraulic fracturing a lot of attention, all stages and byproducts of the drilling process have risks that come with potential for disaster.


Thursday, April 01, 2010
By Janice Crompton, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Property owners living near the site of a gas well operation that caught fire in Washington County Wednesday morning said they had been trying for days to reach state officials about noxious odors at the site.

George Zimmerman, who owns the property where an Atlas Energy wastewater impoundment pond caught fire on Wednesday, and neighbor Kyle Lengauer, said they experienced a "horrendous gas smell" in the days leading up to the fire, but they couldn't reach state officials to warn them.

"We actually left our house on Sunday because the fumes were so bad and we were so nauseated," said Mr. Lengauer, whose lives with his wife and two children on property that abuts Mr. Zimmerman's 480 acres in rural Hopewell.

Both men said they heard a loud explosion at about 8 a.m. Wednesday and saw an impoundment pond on fire with clouds of black smoke.

"I saw about a 100-foot flame -- you could see it seven miles away," said Mr. Zimmerman, who is embroiled in a lawsuit he filed against Moon-based Atlas Energy last year, alleging that the company "ruined his land with toxic chemicals," such as arsenic and benzene, used in hydraulic gas well fracturing.

Mr. Lengauer said he contacted a hotline for the state Department of Environmental Resources on Sunday, but was unable to reach agency officials because their voicemail boxes were full.

"I tried to call them for three days straight," said Mr. Lengauer. More>>>

Fracking not a cleaner alternative: Cornell prof

(Reuters) - Natural gas obtained by the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing may contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions and so should not be considered as a cleaner alternative to coal or oil, according to a Cornell University researcher.

Although natural gas, when burned, produces only about half of the carbon dioxide emissions of coal, that calculation omits greenhouse gas emissions from the well-drilling, water-trucking, pipeline-laying, and forest-felling that are part of the production of hydraulically fractured natural gas, Ecology Professor Robert Howarth argues in a new paper.

Combining the effects of combustion, production, distribution, and leaked methane from hydraulically fractured natural gas gives the fuel about the same greenhouse gas emissions as coal and about 30 percent more than diesel or gasoline, Howarth says in the draft paper published in mid-March.

"A complete consideration of all emissions from using natural gas seems likely to make natural gas far less attractive than other fossil fuels in terms of the consequences for global warming," Howarth writes.

Energy companies are scrambling to develop vast reserves of natural gas from deep shale beds in many U.S. states including Texas, Louisiana, and Pennsylvania. Experts say shale gas could meet national demand for a century while helping to reduce carbon emissions and reducing petroleum imports.

"Government and industry should not be moving ahead on the basis of what is already misleading and incomplete information," Howarth told Reuters. He urged a moratorium on further development in the multibillion-dollar industry until more is known about its greenhouse gas emissions.

The damaging nature of gas from fracturing, or "fracking", undermines claims that it is a "transition" fuel between carbon-intensive sources like coal, and renewables such as solar and wind, Howarth said in the paper.

Citing preliminary data, Howarth estimates total greenhouse gas emissions from hydraulically fractured natural gas may be equivalent to 33 carbon grams of CO2, slightly more than 31.9 grams for coal, and well above the 20.3 grams for diesel or gasoline.

The data are partly based on methane leakage of 1.5 percent of natural gas consumed, a figure assumed by the federal government. More>>>

Obama Offshore Oil Plan a Disaster for Wildlife and Climate

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 31, 2010
11:45 AM
Brendan Cummings, Center for Biological Diversity, (760) 366-2232 x 304

Obama Offshore Oil Plan a Disaster for Wildlife and Climate
WASHINGTON - March 31 - Today President Obama released details of a new national offshore oil-drilling plan that would greatly expand oil leasing far beyond that which was ever authorized by the Bush administration. Prime polar bear habitat in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas off Alaska, opened for leasing under the Bush administration, would remain open to development, while large swaths of the Atlantic Coast and eastern Gulf of Mexico would be opened for the first time.

"Today's announcement is unfortunately all too typical of what we have seen so far from President Obama - promises of change, a year of ‘deliberation,' and ultimately, adoption of flawed and outdated Bush policies as his own," said Brendan Cummings, senior counsel at the Center for Biological Diversity. "Rather than bring about the change we need, this plan will further our national addiction to oil and contribute to global warming, while at the same time directly despoiling the habitat of polar bears, endangered whales, and other imperiled wildlife."

Oil development in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, home to all of America's polar bears, is strongly opposed by conservation groups as no technologies exist to clean up oil spills in icy waters. Oil development in the Beaufort Sea would likely also be visible from the shores of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Today's plan would allow existing leases in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas to move forward while the remainder of these areas would be subject to additional leasing following further environmental studies. More>>>

EPA Disapproves Air Permitting Exemption in Texas

Considering all of the oil and gas development emmissions issues in Texas, I would say this is a good thing.


EPA Disapproves Air Permitting Exemption Program in Texas
Release date: 03/31/2010
Contact Information: Dave Bary at 214-665-2200 or r6press@epa.gov

(Dallas, Texas – March 31, 2010) Today, EPA disapproved the Qualified Facilities exemption rule that TCEQ had submitted for inclusion in its federally approved State Implementation Plan. The rule allows companies that have Texas issued air permits to avoid certain federal clean-air requirements including public review when they modify their plants. EPA has determined that this regulation does not meet several federal Clean Air Act requirements.

“Today’s action improves transparency by requiring companies that modify their operations to notify the public and will assure that all air emitting sources are properly permitted under the Clean Air Act,” said Al Armendariz, Regional Administrator. “Improved public review will better inform our communities about the environmental conditions where they live.”

The Clean Air Act ensures that businesses across the country operate efficiently and cleanly. Under the Act, all states must develop plans for meeting federal requirements to protect pubic health, including an air permitting program. Since EPA approved Texas’ major clean-air permitting plan in 1992, the state has submitted over 30 regulatory changes to the EPA approved plan. Today’s action represents final agency decision on one of those regulatory changes. More>>>

US Oil Company Donated Millions to Climate Change Sceptic Groups, Says Greenpeace

Published on Tuesday, March 30, 2010 by The Guardian/UK
US Oil Company Donated Millions to Climate Sceptic Groups, Says Greenpeace
Report identifies Koch Industries giving $73m to climate sceptic groups 'spreading inaccurate and misleading information'
by John Vidal

A Greenpeace investigation has identified a little-known, privately owned US oil company as the paymaster of global warming sceptics in the US and Europe.
The environmental campaign group accuses Kansas-based Koch Industries, which owns refineries and operates oil pipelines, of funding 35 conservative and libertarian groups, as well as more than 20 congressmen and senators. Between them, Greenpeace says, these groups and individuals have spread misinformation about climate science and led a sustained assault on climate scientists and green alternatives to fossil fuels.

Greenpeace has identified Kansas-based oil firm Koch Industries as a multimillion funder of climate sceptic groups. Greenpeace says that Koch Industries donated nearly $48m (£31.8m) to climate opposition groups between 1997-2008. From 2005-2008, it donated $25m to groups opposed to climate change, nearly three times as much as higher-profile funders that time such as oil company ExxonMobil. Koch also spent $5.7m on political campaigns and $37m on direct lobbying to support fossil fuels.

In a hard-hitting report, which appears to confirm environmentalists' suspicions that there is a well-funded opposition to the science of climate change, Greenpeace accuses the funded groups of "spreading inaccurate and misleading information" about climate science and clean energy companies.

"The company's network of lobbyists, former executives and organisations has created a forceful stream of misinformation that Koch-funded entities produce and disseminate. The propaganda is then replicated, repackaged and echoed many times throughout the Koch-funded web of political front groups and thinktanks," said Greenpeace.

"Koch industries is playing a quiet but dominant role in the global warming debate. This private, out-of-sight corporation has become a financial kingpin of climate science denial and clean energy opposition. On repeated occasions organisations funded by Koch foundations have led the assault on climate science and scientists, 'green jobs', renewable energy and climate policy progress," it says.

The groups include many of the best-known conservative thinktanks in the US more>>>