Report on Causes of "Spent Catalyst" Refinery Accident Draws Criticism at Public Meeting
Also, DeSaulnier sends letter to EPA administrator raising concerns about refinery's safety culture; MUSD teachers to get 6% raise under contract settlement; city water rates to rise 6% annually
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By Tom Lochner
A highly technical report on the causes of the November 2022 "spent catalyst" release at PBF Energy's Martinez refinery fails to address the most important issue, some local watchdogs say.
"Instead of focusing on the mechanical aspects of the incident, the report primarily highlights failures in both worker and management practices," said Alysia Gadde of the refinery accountability community group Healthy Martinez; she spoke via Zoom during a public comment period following a PowerPoint presentation by the independent consultant Scott Berger, whose firm, Scott Berger and Associates, LLC, was hired by the Contra Costa County Health Services Department to investigate the incident.
Despite statements from workers describing pieces of equipment known as slide valves as "sticky and balky," Gadde complained, "there is a notable absence of investigation into the machinery itself."
The Nov. 24-25, 2022 spent catalyst release at Martinez Refining Co., which began the night of Thanksgiving and lasted early into the following morning, sprayed some 20-plus tons of dust laden with toxic metals onto surrounding communities. Refinery officials have said they were unaware of the release until neighbors reported it the following morning.
But it was only the first, and certainly most prominent, of a 13-months-long series of incidents at the refinery, as Congressman Mark DeSaulnier, D-Walnut Creek, noted. In an April 16 letter to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan, DeSaulnier cited some 21 hazardous materials releases or spills, and 46 flaring incidents, that were documented by Contra Costa Health from November 2022 to December 2023.
"The significant increase in incidents is extremely disconcerting, especially in comparison with other similar facilities in the area, and calls attention to a lack of a safety culture at the company," DeSaulnier wrote. He added that MRC is "one of the most complex refineries in the U.S.," according to a widely accepted industry standard, leading to "more opportunity for safety concerns if not properly maintained and regulated."
DeSaulnier raised similar concerns at a town hall on refinery safety last month. In response, MRC issued a statement defending its safety record that said in part: “Although disappointed by the string of incidents that followed 33 months of routine operations following our purchase of the refinery in February 2020, our leaders remain proud of MRC’s safety culture and are confident the steps being taken to improve training and operational reliability will be effective.”
Gadde and several of her cohorts want timely inspections of equipment – and specifically, the stripper slide valve (SSV), a component of refineries that they contend is notoriously prone to failures, but which Berger's report emphatically ruled out as the cause of the Thanksgiving 2022 release. The device did figure in the incident, according to the report, although not as a cause, after it was left in manual mode when it should have been in automatic; the automatic mode enables a quicker adjustment of the flow of catalyst between the stripper and regenerator (the stripper uses steam to strip hydrocarbons from the spent catalyst; the regenerator further cleans the spent catalyst by burning off carbon deposits, allowing the catalyst to be reused.)
"This lack of thorough examination is deeply disappointing," Gadde said. "As a community, we continue to await a more robust and appropriate investigation."
Berger's independent investigation report is available at https://www.cchealth.org/home/showpublisheddocument/29932/638475570133665981 .
The April 11 PowerPoint presentation and video of the meeting can be accessed by clicking the link below:
The origins of the incident go back to shortly after 1 a.m. Nov. 21, 2022, when the refinery's Catalytic Cracking Unit (CCU) shut down automatically due to a failure of control electronics in the regenerator air blower. After repairs, the CCU was brought back online the night of Nov. 24, 2022, according to Berger's report. Around 8:30 p.m. that night, the regenerator overfilled with catalyst, resulting in the release, unnoticed by refinery personnel, of about 24 tons of the catalyst into the city and surrounding areas over the next eight hours; Berger and Associates mentioned, as a factor in the release, the fact that the slide valve was in the manual mode, and that operators did not respond promptly enough to deteriorating conditions. The spent catalyst release stopped around 4:30 a.m. Nov. 25; refinery personnel only learned of it when neighbors reported it the next morning, according to Berger.
The Berger and Associates report identifies eight "root causes" of the Nov. 24-25 incident. The first, singled out on one of the PowerPoint slides, is "Inadequate process hazard analysis guidance re: catalyst release."
Number eight, singled out on the same slide, is "Gaps in site fatigue management system." Earlier in his presentation, Berger mentioned that when the Nov. 21 shutdown occurred, "a key employee with a lot of expertise began a schedule of working excessive hours …. more than 20 hours per day over four days."
Among the other six root causes, two are related to "Procedures," one to "Stop work authority" and three to "Training."
Another slide in the PowerPoint is titled "Malfunction of Stripper Slide Valve Ruled Out." Berger said the issue had come up at several previous public venues, possibly in connection with the 2015 explosion at the then-ExxonMobile refinery in Torrance that regulators said was caused by a degraded stripper slide valve. PBF purchased the Torrance refinery in 2016. Several speakers at the April 11 meeting mentioned the Torrance explosion as well.
But, "This (the Thanksgiving 2022 MRC incident) was a very, very different incident," Berger said, and explained that "the performance of the valve, (and) its ability to control the flow of the catalyst … was not the cause of the high flow from the stripper to the regenerator. It had to do with the mode of control of the valve and the operator action when it was in manual.
"We did have data that showed that the stripper slide valve responded properly to the signals that it received. And there was also some modeling that was done by MRC that showed that if the stripper slide valve had been in automatic, it would have responded fast enough and accurately enough to prevent the incident."
Berger added some possible "contributing factors" in the Nov. 24-25 incident that were "not strictly root causes," such as distractions that might have gotten in the way of operators "stopping to think about what's going on" and delayed manual adjustments to the stripper slide valve; and the absence at MRC of some engineering designs common at other refineries, such as advanced control of differential pressure between the stripper and regenerator, a process that is done manually at MRC but should be done in automatic mode, he said.
Greg Karras of the organization Community Energy reSource said stripper slide valves are "dangerously prone to malfunction – explosions – within three to five years," and warned of the possibility of a "potentially catastrophic" incident. The last inspection of MRC's slide valve occurred in 2018, under the previous owner, Shell Oil Products US; PBF purchased the refinery in 2020.
Karras said his organization has written to county officials urging at least a visual inspection of the slide valve during a major "turnaround" the refinery has announced for May, when many process units will be taken down. Berger's report says the stripper slide valve will be inspected in 2025 when the entire Catalytic Cracking Unit is scheduled to be taken down for maintenance.
"It would be a huge mistake, bordering on negligence, for the company and the county not to take the opportunity to inspect now," Karras said. "You're taking a lot of the refinery down next month anyway. Don't put us at risk. That's not fair. And it's absurd to think that's good engineering practice."
Heidi Taylor said there has been no improvement in MRC's safety culture since the Thanksgiving 2022 release. "The only thing that has gotten better at MRC is public relations."
An additional half-dozen or so refinery critics spoke during the public comment period on April 11. No one from the refinery spoke at the meeting, although MRC spokesman Brandon Matson's name appeared on the sign-in sheet.
Earlier in the meeting, county Hazmat Ombudsman Michael Kent announced his retirement later this month; Kent then introduced Cameron Soo as the person who will take his place. The ombudsman's office email is Hazmat.Ombudsman@cchealth.org .
The evening also featured a bit of silent guerrilla theater, when a woman took a seat in the meeting chamber dressed in a black robe and wearing a skull mask. Asked later if the outfit was related to the refinery issue, she affirmed that it was, and added, "I am Death."
Public comments on the Independent Investigation report can be submitted by email to Hazmat.Arpteam@cchealth.org or by U.S. mail to CCH Hazardous Materials, Attn. Michael Dossey, 4585 Pacheco Blvd., Ste. 100, Martinez CA 94553. The deadline is May 20.
The following items were produced by Craig Lazzeretti
MUSD teachers to get 6% raise under tentative contract settlement
A tentative agreement reached between the Martinez Unified School District and its teachers union, the Martinez Education Association, would grant a 6% raise. If MEA members vote to approve the agreement, it will then go before the MUSD Board of Trustees for approval.
Under the tentative agreement for the 2023-24 contract year, the full raise amount would be retroactive to Jan. 1; 2% would be retroactive to July 1, 2023. The deal also permanently adds one work day to the work year of classroom teachers (bringing the work year to 186 days) and makes no changes to employee benefits.
The raise would come on top of 19% in salary increases granted over the previous two years and at a time when the district is facing a significant structural budget deficit. However, MUSD Chief Business Official Andy Cannon said last week the district will be able to meet its required minimum reserve level of 3% through the next two fiscal years, though he didn’t yet have exact figures.
Assuming that it is approved, the settlement brings to end months of contentious negotiations that led to strike threats by the teachers union. The union initially requested a 10% raise before slightly reducing the figure to 9.5%. The district had countered with a 4% increase (3% salary, 1% toward employee benefits contributions).
District financial projections provided by Cannon showed that had MUSD granted the 9.5% raise sought by MEA, it would have been on track to end the 2025-26 school year with a negative fund balance (absent further budget cuts), meaning that it effectively would be bankrupt.
Cannon provided the following to me in response to an inquiry I made with the district (before the contract settlement was announced) on how the MEA’s requested raise would have impacted the district’s finances.
Although the 6% raise the two sides agreed to should enable the district to meet the 3% reserve level at least through the 2025-26 school year, the district will need to see its financial situation improve or it will face additional budget cuts in coming years. One of the factors hobbling MUSD’s finances is lost revenues from declining enrollment and attendance; MUSD’s total enrollment declined 9.4% from the 2018-19 through the 2022-23 school years, according to the website Ed-Data, compared with a 3.7% decline for the Mt. Diablo Unified School District and 6.2% for Benicia Unified. Superintendent Helen Rossi said she believes the declining enrollment has stemmed primarily from families moving out of state during and after the pandemic, along with falling birthrates and a lack of housing affordability. She said there has been no changes in requests for interdistrict transfers.
City water rates going up 6% annually for next five years
Despite concerns expressed by the public and on the council dais about the impact on the pocketbooks of ratepayers, the City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to raise rates through its municipal water system by 6% annually for the next five fiscal years, beginning in 2024-25. The increases come on top of 9% annual increases that were implemented from 2019 to 2024. City staff said the higher rates were necessary “to meet current costs associated with the treatment and distribution of high-quality drinking water, while planning ahead to address an aging water treatment and distribution system.”
But before the vote, discussion among the council, along with comments from the public, centered largely on whether the city should be doing more to seek grant and other funding opportunities for needed infrastructure upgrades (including through the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021) and/or study ways to have water delivered more cost-effectively to its residents. Martinez is among only a handful of cities in Contra Costa County that operates its own municipal water system, and a slide presented during Wednesday’s PowerPoint presentation to the council indicated that its residents are paying more for water than those of surrounding communities.
Councilman Satinder Malhi asked city staff to look into ways to increase the financial assistance available to low-income households to reflect the rising rates, and to look for ways to minimize rate hikes going forward.
“We need to do a better job of fully exhausting all available funding sources that are on the table,” he said. “I don’t want to put any additional burden on our residents…People are struggling. It’s hard out there for a lot of folks.”
Meilin Duncan, one of a handful of residents who criticized the rate increases during public comment, said that she had gotten seven additional households in her courtyard to file letters protesting the hikes.
“The rate increases do seem excessively high over the last five years,” she said, noting the 9% annual increases. “We’re going to tack on 6% more over the next five years each year. That’s over 30% because we’re compounding over those years. If there’s no accountability for what’s being done and what’s being planned to be done, I’d rather see grants being written for individual projects instead of the rate increases going to us as ratepayers. Water is higher than everywhere else in our area, and I’d like to see that change.”
MRC turnaround project set to start
Beginning Monday, PBF’s Martinez refinery will begin a major maintenance project, also known as a “turnaround.” Nearby residents should be prepared for some impacts in their neighborhoods. According to MRC:
Due to the temporary increase in our contract workforce, we expect more vehicles in the mornings and evenings on the following roads near the refinery during the turnaround: Marina Vista between I-680 and Shell Avenue; Pacheco Blvd between I-680 and Howe Road.
We have carefully planned this work to minimize impact to our neighbors, including mobilizing resources to address potential traffic impacts. There may also be periodic noise and additional lighting at night associated with the turnaround. All appropriate agencies have been notified of our plans. … if you have questions, please call our Weekday Phone Number at (925) 313-3777 or our After-Hours Phone Number at (925) 313-3601.”
City resumes docent hikes of Alhambra Hills
As it did last year, the city is again offering docent-led hikes through its new Alhambra Hills open space (I attended one last year and found it to be an enjoyable, scenic experience). The 1.5-mile hikes are free, and registration is offered through the Martinez Recreation’s Department activities page. Link: https://secure.rec1.com/CA/City-Martinez/catalog?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR19Al0pzysLllukjX1UWcVfsTUjamvFR6ZAiaxpIy4RdF2Tfj0tWYZ4bvA_aem_Ad9oFBV76zM46dnrigZnvIZ6gzsj14PCUVIhE-83BA9sjAJfZSfSalQMktIVNCXJaIYXesFyKY4epLNLyIkEzJ9h