Torrance, Mobil Talks on Picking Refinery Safety Adviser at Impasse
Negotiations to select a safety adviser for Mobil Oil Corp.’s Torrance refinery officially reached a standoff Wednesday when attorneys for both sides returned to court to debate the issue.
Retired Judge Harry V. Peetris said he would accept written arguments from Mobil and the city of Torrance before conducting a formal hearing on the matter April 10. If the standoff continues, Peetris can pick the adviser.
Torrance officials have nominated SRI International, a nonprofit research firm based in Menlo Park, to serve in the advisory position, which was created as a key component in a consent decree ending the city’s public-nuisance lawsuit against Mobil last fall.
Mobil has nominated Westinghouse’s Energy Systems Business Unit, which primarily designs and services commercial nuclear power plants but also assesses risks for the nuclear and petrochemical industries.
Under the consent decree, signed by Mobil and the city in October, the adviser will analyze safety procedures at the refinery, make recommendations to improve those measures and oversee the modification or seven-year phase-out of highly toxic hydrofluoric acid at the plant.
Since both sides announced their nominees late last year, attorneys for Mobil and the city have met periodically but have not reached agreement.
On Wednesday, both sides for the first time revealed some of their criticisms of each other’s nominee.
The city warned that Westinghouse’s selection would “put a cloud over the entire proceedings.” Attorney Ralph Nutter said the city is primarily concerned about Westinghouse’s objectivity.
Because the company operates nuclear power plants, Nutter said, it must negotiate with the same labor union--the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers--that represents Mobil’s employees.
In addition, Westinghouse holds other contracts with Mobil for services and supplies, and this might influence its actions as safety adviser, Nutter said.
And, he noted, the city previously has sued Westinghouse in another matter and may soon become entangled with the company in other litigation.
In 1986, Torrance sued the company when its cable television subsidiary, Group W, tried to turn over operation of Torrance’s system to Century Cable. Following protracted negotiations, a different company--American Telecommunications Corp.--gained control of the system under the auspices of Paragon Cable.
Last month, two of the defendants in a federal lawsuit against Westinghouse and seven other companies began notifying nearly 100 municipalities, including Torrance, that they may soon be drawn into the lawsuit as defend ants.
The suit charges that the companies dumped highly toxic chemicals in the ocean, in most cases by way of sewer outfalls. Two of the companies, Simpson Paper Co. and Potlach Corp., contend that the cities should bear partial responsibility for the pollution because the chemicals traveled through their sewer lines.
Attorneys for Mobil declined to respond to Torrance’s conflict-of- interest allegations. Instead, Mobil criticized SRI International as lacking experience in the petrochemical field.
“Mobil would object very strongly to SRI, and we would urge (the selection of) Westinghouse,” attorney Max Gillam told Peetris, saying only that experience “or lack thereof” is the “key and pivotal issue” dividing the two sides.
Nutter disagreed. “Their statement that (Westinghouse) has more refinery and petrochemical experience than SRI is incorrect,” Nutter said. “We think it’s the other way around.”
Mobil said the main goal should be to select a qualified company.
“We think it’s extremely important to get the right person, the right entity, because we’re going to have to live with them for seven years,” Gillam said.
Nutter, noting that the City Council has expressed concern because selection of a safety adviser has dragged on for nearly five months, urged Peetris to make a choice soon.
“You keep talking about seven years,” Nutter said to Gillam. “It won’t be seven years if we keep on like this.”
