Fire Extinguished at Shell's Deer Park Chemicals Complex -- OPIS
May 08 2023 - 3:14PM
Dow Jones News
A fire at one of the production units at Shell's Deer Park,
Texas, chemicals complex on Friday afternoon was extinguished
Sunday night, according to a press conference Monday afternoon.
The unified response group to the incident consists of the U.S.
Coast Guard, Texas General Land Office, Texas Commission on
Environmental Quality and other authorities jointly with Shell
Chemicals' response team.
Hot spots are still being monitored, the response group
announced. In addition the chemical discharge valve from the
facility had been closed, resulting in no further material exiting
the facility.
Fence-line air monitoring efforts from multiple local agencies
indicated that air quality is not a threat to nearby
communities.
The commission stated that it will be collecting and testing
water samples from the facility as part of the ongoing
investigation as to the fire and discharge's impact to the
surrounding environment.
A Shell plant manager stated that the company has not issued
force majeure relating to the incident and that it is evaluating
the production status of the facility as more information regarding
the fire emerges. The facility has alerted communities that they
will likely see intermittent flaring, per the site's Twitter
account.
A Coast Guard representative stated that the latest discharge
from the facility into the Houston Ship Channel has not shown any
negative impacts to local waterways and will continue to focus its
efforts on waste mitigation. Nearby retention ponds are being used
to cool some facility equipment.
The fire initially started at the facility's olefins unit while
igniting products including cracked heavy gas oil, cracked light
gas oil and gasoline, according to the facility's Twitter
account.
Shell operates two olefins units at the chemicals complex with a
total nameplate capacity of 2.6 billion lbs/year of ethylene, or
roughly 3% of North American capacity.
U.S. Gulf Coast ethylene prices were higher as of midday Monday,
with prices at the Enterprise hub (MtB-EPC) in Mont Belvieu, Texas,
above 17cts/lb and prices at the Choctaw hub in Louisiana at around
15cts/lb.
This content was created by Oil Price Information Service, which
is operated by Dow Jones & Co. OPIS is run independently from
Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
--Reporting by Adam Burkin, aburkin@opisnet.com; Editing by Anna
Matherne, amatherne@opisnet.com, and Barbara Chuck,
bchuck@opisnet.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 08, 2023 14:59 ET (18:59 GMT)
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