Fire at another Exxon plant in Baytown leaves 37 hurt
Fourth chemical blaze in Houston area since March shows need for stronger safety, environmental rules, activists say
A fire Wednesday morning at an Exxon Mobil plant in Baytown injured 37 people and sent a plume of smoke over a Houston-area chemical facility for the fourth time since March.
It was the second fire this year at an Exxon Mobil facility in Baytown. The company’s operations in the east Harris County city have a history of environmental violations stretching back to 2013.
The cause of Wednesday’s fire was not immediately known, although the company said the blaze began with an explosion. Jason Duncan, the plant manager of the Olefins unit where Wednesday’s fire occurred, said most of the injured suffered burns and none had to be hospitalized.
Harris County monitors did not show air toxins at a concerning level as of the afternoon. An order that residents in adjacent neighborhoods shelter in place was lifted after a few hours.
Company officials said the fire started in an area used to purify the chemical propylene, which is used as a fuel and in making plastics.
Joshua Howell, who lives in the Craigmont neighborhood near the plant, said he felt the explosion as he was driving home from work.
It was loud enough to “shake windows and upset the dogs,” he said.
Exxon Mobil is the defendant in a lawsuit filed by Harris County alleging environmental violations stemming from a fire at a Baytown facility in March. Fires also occurred in March at the Intercontinental Terminals Co. plant in Deer Park and in April at the KMCO chemical plant in Crosby.
A Houston Chronicle investigation from 2016 found that a major chemical incident occurs once every six weeks in Greater Houston. Advocates said Wednesday’s fire again demonstrated the need for stronger enforcement of safety and environmental rules.
“Nothing’s going to change
unless we have real leadership at the state and federal level,” said Luke Metzger, executive director of Environment Texas, an environmental advocacy organization. “I’m not holding my breath.”
History of violations
Exxon’s three Baytown plants have repeatedly been cited for violating regulations, with limited consequences.
The facility has violated the Clean Air Act for the last three years, according to Environmental Protection Agency data. The EPA and the state fined the company a combined $3.8 million last year after the federal agency’s investigation found that Exxon Mobil was not properly operating or monitoring flares at facilities in Texas and Louisiana. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality fined the facility in 2016 and 2018 for air pollution violations.
Metzger said he toured the Olefin facility in 2012 and observed that the 100-year-old plant needed “major upgrades.”
Combined, Exxon’s three Baytown area plants are among the biggest polluters in the area, he said. Environment Texas has sued over emissions from all three plants.
In 2017, U.S. District Judge David Hittner ordered Exxon Mobil to pay nearly $20 million as a result of the Environment Texas litigation.
The company completed a multibillion-dollar petrochemical expansion at the Baytown campus over a year ago. According to a 2015 inventory, more than 100 chemicals were present at the facility.
Duncan, the plant manager, said Exon Mobil is committed to the safety of its workers and the well-being of surrounding communities.
“At Exxon Mobil, our top priority continues to be caring for our people and our communities in the facilities in which we operate,” he said.
A 2016 Chronicle report, researched in coordination with Texas A&M University, found that Exxon Mobil’s Olefins facility posed a medium potential for harm — 9.72 on a 14-point scale. The report evaluated facilities based on the potential dangers posed by chemicals on site and the number of people who lived nearby.
The March fire at another Exxon Mobil Baytown facility burned for several hours. The plant released pollutants including sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide and benzene for eight days.
Rock Owens, managing attorney for the Harris County Attorney’s environmental section, said the county is considering whether to sue Exxon Mobil for Wednesday’s incident, waiting first to see what the company will do on its own.
“The way to prevent these things is a rigorous inspection program where the company is held responsible for not doing sufficient risk-management planning,” Owens said.
The March Exxon Mobil fire was largely overshadowed by the by the three-day blaze at the Deer Park ITC facility just afterward, which dumped an unknown amount of chemicals into the water and air.
Just two weeks after the ITC conflagration, an April blaze at the KMCO chemical plant in Crosby killed one worker and injured two.
“It’s difficult to look out your window and see a plume of smoke. It’s frightening,” said Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo. “It’s not right for us to live next to a petrochemical plant and live in fear sometimes. We have been working incredibly hard to address that situation.”
‘A big boom’
Freddie Landry works near the Exxon Olefins plant where a silo caught fire. He said he heard a massive “boom” before flames shot into the sky.
“The crane guys were moving pipe for me, so we can proceed and finish our job,” Landry said. “I heard a big boom. The crane went up, and the guys said it exploded. No hesitation. We all turned around and took off.”
The small crew was trapped inside the plant grounds when they hit a fenced-in corner. They couldn’t go back, he said. The fire was behind them.
“The gates were locked,” Landry said. “I started looking around and found some pipe we could step on and move over the gate.”
The crew made it out of the facility.