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Environment & Safety

Innovations

Hydrocarbon Processing Staff: Andrew, Bob

Planned shutdowns, turnarounds and outages (STOs) are often scheduled for preventive maintenance and new equipment installation that must be performed to keep a plant running and in regulatory compliance.

GE to provide wastewater treatment for Chinese coal-to-chemical plant

GE’s ZLD evaporator and crystallizer system will eliminate liquid discharge of waste and enable water reuse at the Shaanxi Future Energy Chemical Co. coal-to-chemical plant in China.

Death toll from Mexican chemical blast rises to 32

The massive explosion took place on Wednesday afternoon at the facility's chlorinate 3 plant in the Gulf state of Veracruz, sending a black cloud of smoke hundreds of meters into the air and giving off a powerful smell of ammonia.

Pemex petrochemical plant explosion kills dozens, injures hundreds

HP Editorial Staff: HP News Services

At least 32 people died and 136 were injured after a leak caused a deadly explosion at the plant, and the death toll could still rise further, according to the CEO of oil giant Pemex.

Petroecuador halts Esmeraldas refinery on quake

Petroecuador said it would assess when to restart operations during the day after verifying that no infrastructure was damaged by the 7.8 magnitude quake which struck off the country's Pacific coast.

Cheap oil is blunting drive for fuel efficiency

HP Editorial Staff: HP News Services

Now that the costs of transport fuel have dropped sharply and appear set to remain low for several years, the focus will shift from efficiency to speed, power and convenience.

API poll: High ethanol mandates worry US voters

“Across the political spectrum, voters are concerned about the significant damage the RFS mandate and higher ethanol blends could cause to automobiles, motorcycles and almost every type of gasoline powered engine,” said Frank Macchiarola, downstream group director at the API.

Lyondell cuts Houston refinery output after fire

A large fire broke out Friday morning at LyondellBasell’s 263,776-bpd Houston refinery in Texas. It is the second major refinery fire in two days in the metro Houston area.

Fire erupts at ExxonMobil’s Baytown refinery

Exxon said the fire was later extinguished, no workers were injured and output would not be hurt at the 560,500-bpd oil refinery, the second-largest in the United States.

Keystone pipeline closure leads Phillips 66 to shut Illinois refinery units

Phillips' refinery in Wood River, Illinois, has shut down a 64,000-bpd sour crude unit and a 16,000-bpd coker due to the disruption in supply, two sources told Reuters.