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Page added on March 12, 2017
Southern Communities Brace for the Impact of Big Oil’s Expansion Plans
President Donald Trump kicked off this week with a Monday morning tweet hailing — and seeming to wrongly take credit for — Exxon Mobil’s plan for a $20 billion expansion of its refineries, chemical plants and liquefied natural gas operations along the U.S. Gulf Coast.
“We are already winning again, America!” Trump tweeted after the Texas-based company released the latest details of a plan first announced in 2013 in response to rising natural gas supplies. He went on to tweet, “Buy American & hire American are the principals at the core of my agenda, which is: JOBS, JOBS, JOBS.” The company says the expansion, which includes projects at 11 proposed and existing sites in the region, could create as many as 35,000 temporary construction jobs and 12,000 permanent jobs.
But for communities that are already bearing the brunt of the industry’s environmental impact, the expansion is a more complicated matter than just a jobs creator: It also means living with more pollution and other safety hazards.
This week, the Louisiana Bucket Brigade and DisasterMap.net released their latest tally of petrochemical accidents in the state. During the first two weeks of February alone, the environmental group documented 78 such accidents, including 14 on offshore drilling platforms in Louisiana waters. One of the accidents killed a pipeline worker, while another released cancer-causing benzene into the St. James community. (There was another reported spill in St. James last week, when a storage tank owned by Houston-based Plains All American Pipeline released over 12,500 gallons of crude oil, with an unknown amount flowing out of the containment and into a ditch.)
The Bucket Brigade’s report serves as a reminder of the industry’s long record of safety problems. For example, oil and gas extraction workers have an on-the-job fatality rate seven times greater than the rate for all U.S. industries, while the oil and gas industry is among the world’s worst polluters.
Exxon Mobil has its own history of serious environmental health and safety problems: the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska, toxic releases, deadly incidents at its plants. The company’s Baytown, Texas, facility — among the existing facilities slated for expansion along with plants in Beaumont, Texas, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana — has been identified as one of America’s “super polluters.” And among the incidents documented in the latest Louisiana spill report involved the release of cancer-causing 1,3-butadiene from one of Exxon Mobil’s Baton Rouge plants.
Accidents aside, the oil and gas industry takes a heavy toll on environmental health even when operating normally. Consider the tremendous amount of toxic chemicals Exxon Mobil’s refinery and petrochemical facilities in Baton Rouge alone released in 2015: over 3.1 million pounds to the air and another 1 million pounds to surface waters, according to the company’s Toxics Release Inventory data self-reported to the Environmental Protection Agency. These include cancer-causing chemicals like benzene, lead and solvents.
Meanwhile, the fence-line communities most directly affected by the industry’s chronic pollution and frequent accidents are rarely white and wealthy — and now it’s even less likely that they will be get help from federal regulators to help them deal with state regulatory agencies influenced by the industry’s outsized political power (almost $85 million in total contributions in 2016 alone, according to the National Institute on Money in State Politics’ FollowTheMoney.org database).
That’s because the Trump administration has proposed $2 billion in cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency — and shuttering its environmental justice office altogether.
“We see these consistently high numbers of accidents in the oil and gas industry on one hand and a plan to systematically dismantle the Environmental Protection Agency on the other hand,” said Renate Heurich of the environmental advocacy group 350 Louisiana. “Given these conditions, we can predict that even more people will lose their health or their lives as a direct consequence.”
14 Comments on "Southern Communities Brace for the Impact of Big Oil’s Expansion Plans"
Sissyfuss on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 11:15 am
In the never ending choice between the economy and the ecology, we all know where President Bombastic is placing his tiny hands.
penury on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 1:07 pm
Perhaps, maybe it is time for the states to regulate those industries located within their borders and stop relying upon big daddy to pay all the bills and do the nasty job of control. Perhaps something like say Texas and possibly La currently do? Perhaps what Potus is saying is that locals have a better idea of what is needed than Wash D.C, Just a thought.
JN2 on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 3:24 pm
Penury: “Perhaps something like say Texas and possibly La currently do? ”
Did you read the article? TX and LA are the main problem areas!
penury on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 4:23 pm
Perhaps, and I am strictly surmising here, as two of the states with the best local interest in the problem, these states may maintain better reporting rather than leaving all of that to the Feds. I do not see very many statistics for Pa,Oh,MT even Wa.
rockman on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 5:22 pm
“Did you read the article? TX and LA are the main problem areas!” To add to penury’s point: well, da!. LOL. Of course the two states that dominate the petrochemical industry have the highest number of incidents. The feds have never had a meaningful impact on the industry in Texas. The state agencies are THE watchdogs. The Rockman should know: he lives directly across the highway from ExxonMobil Baytown refinery. And President Trump’s credit for refinery expansions? What an asinine implication to make: the Texas refinery expansion began 2 years ago during President Obama’s administration. Within 10 miles of the Rockman’s home there has been a $35 BILLION expansion program going on at multiple facilities long before the current POTUS took office.
Yes: pollution and deaths happen at refineries. And as dangerous as refineries can be the body counts there aren’t nearly as high as seen in the home bathroom. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, every year about 235,000 people over age 15 visit emergency rooms because of injuries suffered in the bathroom, and almost 14 percent are hospitalized. But given there’s constant safety inspections happening at refineries there’s no similar program ongoing for your bathroom. LOL.
No of which is meant to minimize industrial accidents happening anywhere. But there is no aspect of daily life that is risk free. Life is nothing but a constant evaluation of benefit to risk. And while every reasonable effort to reduce the risk should be taken one cannot condemn any human activity just because of the potential for accidents.
makati1 on Sun, 12th Mar 2017 6:49 pm
As the Imperial show moves into the last act, and the fat lady is spraying her throat for the grand finale, all kinds of pollution will go exponential in the U$ as systems break down all over the country. A country wide Chernobyl, Fukushima, Love Canal type of destruction seems to be waiting in the wings to make their appearance.
Food systems poisoned by Dow and Bayer/Monsanto. Water and sewer systems are breaking down. Pipelines of all kinds are leaking more and more. Train wrecks. The 100+ ancient nuke plants on life support. Not to mention the thousands of tons or spent fuel that is still deadly in glorified swimming pools. And ZERO money to do anything about any of them except lie and ignore no matter what Trump is promising.
The 1st world has so much more to lose.
rockman on Mon, 13th Mar 2017 10:35 am
mak – “…all kinds of pollution will go exponential in the U$ as systems break down all over the country.” You mean like it the Philippines which produces 70%+ of its electricity from climate destroying fossil fuels? LOL.
BobInget on Mon, 13th Mar 2017 1:26 pm
Rockman, whats the elevation around these new and older refineries. We know what happens when refineries flood.
Will US taxpayers be stuck with building dikes and flood control?
DerHundistlos on Tue, 14th Mar 2017 4:20 pm
Funny how the states with the worst environmental regulations and enforcement are the same states who take more from the taxpayers than they contribute. Yep, the evil Blue states provide the financing for Red state welfare governments.
YES @ JN2
Davy on Tue, 14th Mar 2017 5:00 pm
“Yep, the evil Blue states provide the financing for Red state welfare governments.”
Yeap, Der Hund, like the rich and privileged don’t get free money and opportunity by a system that is rigged in their favor. Please spare me the BS Der Hund on the red and blue of things. Blue states are dominated by the rich and affluent and they are where much of the wealth transfer is going.
DerHundistlos on Tue, 14th Mar 2017 11:39 pm
Davy, you have a BS answer for everything. And why do wealthy people desire to live in Blue States? Better quality of life, better schools, better environment, better, better, better. I say fuck the Red states. They must learn to live within their self-imposed financial means. Isn’t that the definition of conservatism? Or, as you imply, their subsidy payments are justified . They bitch, but have no problem holding their hand out for $$$$$$$$ from the evil Blues.
makati1 on Tue, 14th Mar 2017 11:42 pm
Hang the elites. The world would be better without them. I’ll buy the rope.
GregT on Tue, 14th Mar 2017 11:57 pm
So much for the Red, white and Blue.
Untied we stand, divided we fall.
(Can’t remember exactly where I read that before, but it seemed fitting given the circumstances.)
GregT on Wed, 15th Mar 2017 12:07 am
United we stand, divided we fall.
Not untied.