ANACORTES, Wash. — The federal government is accusing an Anacortes refinery of causing pollution that hurts air quality and can make people sick. Now the Tesoro refinery will have to change its ways.
John Deman has lived around paper and pulp mills, worked near nuclear material in eastern Washington and for the past 20 years has looked at a skyline that includes oil refineries in Anacortes.
Yet at 84 years old he’s almost perfectly healthy.
"I can't say that (my health has been perfect). I've had skin cancer,” he told us. He blames the sun for that one.
He had no idea that according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency he's been breathing in toxic pollutants from the Tesoro refinery suspected to cause cancer and birth defects.
And along with another company, Tesoro will pay more than $400 million to fix that.
"$400 million -- almost half a billion dollars. What in the world did they do?" Deman asked.
At a news conference Monday along Seattle's Waterfront, the U.S. Department of Justice said the companies failed to have the proper pollution controls in place.
Tesoro and the other company settled the case and in addition to the hundreds of millions of dollars in fixes that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 60 percent, Tesoro will also pay a nearly $10.5 million civil penalty.
The refinery in Anacortes is one of six alleged to have violated the Clean Air Act.
"The good news about Anacortes is they've been pursuing the directives for years. We have no concern that the Anacortes refinery will meet all requirements set forth and will do so in advance," Mark Admundson, director of the Northwest Clean Air Agency, said.
Tesoro sent us a statement about the settlement, saying in part that while it agreed to settle the allegations of violations, it is not an admission that those allegations were true or correct.
The settlement with Tesoro Corp. and Par Hawaii Refining resolves alleged violations of the federal Clean Air Act involving five refineries that Tesoro operates in Kenai, Alaska; Anacortes, Washington; Salt Lake City; Mandan, North Dakota; and Martinez, California. It also covers Par Hawaii's refinery in Kapolei, Hawaii.
Under the consent decree filed in federal court in Texas Monday, the companies will spend about $403 million to install equipment to control emissions at the refineries, which process crude oil into gasoline, diesel fuel and other products.
Tesoro, based in San Antonio, Texas, will also spend about $12 million for environmental projects in communities affected by the pollution. The company will also pay a $10.45 million civil penalty.
On April 2, 2010, seven workers were killed at the Tesoro plant in Anacortes. A four-year investigation found that over time, high-temperature hydrogen in the pressurized heat exchangers used to purify crude oil had caused tiny cracks in the steel pipes. The morning of the explosion, one of those cracks ripped open.
As of April 2016, the EPA had fined the Tesoro refinery in Anacortes nearly $720,000 for alleged safety violations.
Cox Media Group
