Refinery Self-Tests Bar Mobil : Troubled Torrance Facility Excluded From AQMD Plan
The list of oil refineries air quality officials will trust to inspect their own storage tanks for toxic emissions includes refineries of every major oil company in Southern California except one: Mobil Oil’s troubled Torrance facility.
Criteria for selection in the proposed self-inspection program included compliance with air quality regulations, a low number of complaints and a willingness to improve safety and the environment, South Coast Air Quality Management District officials said.
“We’re disappointed that we are not being invited to participate in the program,” said Mobil spokesman Barry Engelberg. “Our tank seal inspection program in the refinery, we feel, is a very good one. Mobil volunteered to participate in the program and still hopes that it can.”
High in Complaints
Mobil and the tiny Powerine installation in Santa Fe Springs, which also is not on the list, instead achieved a distinction of another sort this week:
The two refineries have the worst record in terms of air quality violations and complaints, according to figures released this week by the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
The AQMD ranked 10 refineries in recommending them for participation in a pilot self-inspection program for oil storage tanks.
The program aims to replace annual AQMD inspections--by representatives who check to see that toxic gases are not released--with examinations by specially trained refinery employees.
The self-inspection program for oil storage tanks, which will cover 671 of the 820 tanks in four counties currently inspected annually by AQMD personnel, goes before the district board for approval Friday. The board also will consider at that time proposals to establish similar procedures for aerospace, furniture manufacturing and oil processing facilities.
Companies on the list to participate in the self-inspection program “were nominated on the basis of their track record, because they had been fairly successful in holding down the violations and complaints,” said AQMD spokesman Tom Eichhorn.
While declining to discuss why Mobil and Powerine were not considered eligible for the self-inspection program, Eichhorn said: “We would be remiss to nominate companies without knowledge of their track record, spelled out by their complaints, violations, the attitude we encounter, the quality of maintenance and other subjective factors.”
Powerine officials did not return phone calls seeking comment.
According to the AQMD ranking, which covered the period from Jan. 1, 1988, until the end of September, the Powerine Oil Co. refinery had 818 complaints and 30 violations, the most in each category. Mobil was second in both categories, with 434 complaints and 24 violations.
In Torrance, where the city has sued Mobil, alleging its refinery is a public nuisance, Councilman Dan Walker said he would have objected if Mobil had been allowed to participate.
“I’d be screaming to high heaven,” Walker said. “The facts speak for themselves. Mobil has had far more than their share of problems. I don’t know how anyone could even conceive of the idea with a straight face.”
In Santa Fe Springs, Fire Chief Robert Wilson said that the Powerine refinery generates “an abnormally high number of releases (of toxic gases).”
Wilson said that Santa Fe Springs officials are asking Powerine to pay for alarms that would alert nearby businesses to emissions, and also for a program to monitor the long-term health effects of exposure to emissions.
The idea behind the AQMD self-inspection program is to reward industry’s good performance by loosening strict inspection procedures. All self-inspection reports will be reviewed by AQMD staff and 20% will be selected at random for a more rigorous audit, which will include unannounced site inspections. Industries submitting inaccurate forms will be subject to fines of up to $25,000 a day.
Some activists who are concerned with environmental and safety issues oppose the program.
Mark Abramowitz, program director of the Santa-Monica-based Coalition for Clean Air, said: “It’s the old fox in the chicken coop routine. Actually, it’s more like a luxury suite in the hen house for that fox.”
Abramowitz said he plans to appear at Friday’s AQMD board meeting to ask that, as part of the self-inspection program, environmentalists receive training on how to conduct the inspections and be allowed 24-hour access to the storage tanks.
Area refineries are pleased with the AQMD proposal, said Mike Wang of the Western States Petroleum Assn. “We were trying for a long time to develop self-inspection programs. When the South Coast (AQMD) wanted to have a self-inspection program, we thought that was great.”
AQMD officials said the pilot program is scheduled to start Monday with training of refinery employees. During the one-year program, each tank is to be inspected at least twice by certified inspectors.
