ITC to pay $6.6M for 2019 tank fire damage
Intercontinental Terminals Co. has agreed to pay more than $6.6 million to compensate for the natural resource damages caused by the 2019 fire at its Deer Park terminal, federal and state officials said Tuesday.
The fire, which burned for three days, ripped through 15 atmospheric storage tanks for toxic chemicals, filling the air with thick black smoke and sending chemicals into the Houston Ship Channel, combining with polluting firefighting foam along the way. In July 2023, the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board found ITC could have prevented the blaze.
The Texas Attorney General’s Office and the U.S. Department of Justice announced the payout after they filed a civil complaint and a proposed consent decree on the incident. The agreement will go through a 30-day public comment period and needs final court approval.
The $6.65 million settlement designated the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Texas General Land Office, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as recipients of the funds.
In an earlier settlement, the Environmental Protection Agency got $5.25 million from
the company for their costs incurred responding to the releases. Harris County separately received a $900,000 settlement from ITC in 2021 after suing them for illegal development in a floodplain and pollutants discharged into the public stormwater system. Numerous personal injury cases are still pending.
The 2019 fire released an estimated 470,000 to 523,000 barrels
of hydrocarbon and petrochemical products. Burning chemical smells filled the area, and cancer-causing benzene lingered in the air for weeks. Firefighters battled to contain the blaze, and the flow of contaminated water into Tucker Bayou and Houston Ship Channel spread far and wide after a dike wall broke during the response. Researchers found hazardous chemicals lingering in
local waterways for months after the incident. No ITC personnel or emergency responders were injured in the blaze.
In a Tuesday statement, the U.S. Department of Justice said the hazardous releases “caused significant injuries to ecological resources and services, including birds and marsh and riparian habitat areas,” and forced the closure of state, county and city parks.
“This settlement will help repair, in part, the devastating environmental damage caused by the release of hazardous substances from ITC’S Deer Park facility,” said U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani for the Southern District of Texas.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton reiterated that the threeday fire severely contaminated local air quality and land, noting that a separate environmental enforcement lawsuit against the company was still pending.
“All companies operating in our state must take the utmost precaution to prevent any such disaster from harming our citizens and our environment,” Paxton said.
“Following the fire, ITC worked collaboratively with state and federal authorities to resolve claims related to natural resource damages,” the company said in a statement. “We are pleased to reach resolution of these claims, and we are committed to continually implementing enhancements to the safety, environmental integrity and emergency response capabilities at the terminal.”
State and federal announcements said the settlement funds would be used to compensate the public, reimburse trustee agencies for damage assessment costs and fund environmental restoration. ITC already paid about $1 million to the same federal and state agencies for their initial assessment costs.