BP refinery back up to 100%
By T.J. Aulds
The Daily News Published January 3, 2009TEXAS CITY – For the first time in about three years, BP’s Texas City refinery is operating at full capacity. The company confirmed Friday that the final unit to be refurbished since a refinerywide overhaul began in 2005 went online this week.
With the start up of Ultraformer No. 3, the nation’s third largest refinery now has a crude refining capacity of 475,000 barrels per day, company spokesman Michael Marr said. All of the refinery’s 20 major process units are functionally at normal levels.
An ultraformer is used to make high-octane fuel. The restart of the Ultraformer No. 3 began last month.
The restart marks a milestone for BP, which began the $1 billion overhaul of the refinery shortly after Hurricane Rita forced the facility to shut down in September 2005. BP had pledged to complete the upgrades by the end of 2008.
However, the unit-by-unit overhaul was in response to an explosion on March 23, 2005, that killed 15 contract workers and injured 170 others.
Government investigators and BP’s own investigative panel revealed the company was lax in its ongoing maintenance of the Texas City refinery and had used outdated equipment.
The company has settled all of the lawsuits related to the blast but is awaiting a federal judge’s ruling on whether it will be able to settle with the federal government to avoid criminal prosecution. Galveston County District Attorney Kurt Sistrunk has said he would wait until all of the lawsuits and federal investigations were complete before deciding whether his office would seek charges.
BP officials said that, in addition to the physical overhaul of the refinery, a cultural change has taken place.
“We have systematically inspected and refurbished major process units,” Marr said. “We have doubled the amount of training occurring at the refinery each year. The staff responsible for process safety at the refinery has been doubled. The management team has been strengthened through the addition of new members from both inside and outside BP.”
