Unable to Meet Deadline for Upgrade, Some Gas Stations Close

A federal antipollution deadline kicks in today, booting Manuel Lopez from the Hollywood Boulevard gas station he has spent half his life running.

Lopez and potentially hundreds of operators of small and independent gas stations in Southern California are supposed to stop selling fuel at midnight if they did not meet a government deadline to replace or upgrade their underground gasoline storage tanks.

Like many operators, Lopez said it is too expensive to comply with the new regulations, which are not expected to raise gas prices. Federal officials point out that station owners have had 10 years to comply.

But Lopez said he did not know that the Chevron Corp.--which owns his station and provides the gas--wasn’t going to pay for the upgrades until a few months ago. On Tuesday, he spent the day cleaning out the small but tidy station at Hollywood Boulevard and Gower Street.

“What can I do? Nothing,” said Lopez, 65, who worked his way up from pump jockey to manager since coming to Los Angeles from Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula 37 years ago.

“I am very sad,” he said. “I have spent most of my life at this place.”

He is not alone in his predicament.

Gas stations across the nation are being forced to replace unreinforced underground tanks built before 1984 with double-walled tanks. The upgrade reduces the risk of gasoline leakage into ground water. Government officials estimate that nearly one in four of the older tanks leak.

The Environmental Protection Agency also is requiring some gas station owners to install special monitoring systems, new pumps and dispensers and corrosion protection for underground pipes.

The cost to most stations has been between $100,000 and $200,000. Stations are not expected to pass that expense along to consumers because of the competitive nature of the gasoline business and its normally razor-thin profit margin.

EPA Administrator Carol Browner said Tuesday that customers are not likely to be much affected by closures because most stations are owned by the major oil companies, which have complied with the new requirements.

The requirements, however, have caused financial hardship among the owners of independent and small stations, who control about a quarter of the county’s 2,350 gas stations, said Jay McKeeman, executive director of the California Independent Oil Marketers Assn.

He said many are shutting down because they can’t afford to pay or borrow for the upgrades.

Lopez, who leases his station from Chevron, said it has the newer tanks, but it needs new pumps and pipelines to comply with federal regulations. At first, he said, Chevron officials told him the firm would pay for the upgrades.

But Chevron changed its stance in September because its lease on the property expires in two years, Lopez said. “I tried,” he said, “but they don’t want to change their mind.”

A father of six grown children, Lopez plans to turn the small garage he runs next to the gas station into his full-time business.

Chevron spokeswoman Dawn Soper said that “the decision not to upgrade” Lopez’s station “was primarily economic. It just didn’t wash out economically.”

Browner said the EPA sympathizes with the plight of such station owners.

Although inspectors will be out in force today to ensure that the larger, corporate stations are in compliance, she said, the smaller operators will be given several months grace time if they show a good-faith effort to meet the requirements.

“We will be working with the mom and pops to help them, to do what is right for them, to try to get the upgrades in place” without forcing them to shut down, Browner said.

She said the federal government and many states are looking at providing low-income loans and other financial aid to help independent owners comply with the regulations.