ARCO Chemical originated in 1966 as a division of the Atlantic Richfield Company, one of the largest and oldest oil companies in the United States. Portions of Interstate 76 and the city's Platt Bridge were temporarily closed after the fire, according to the city's Office of Emergency Management. Hirsig instituted a quality control program. Source: International Directory of Company Histories, Vol. Harold A. Sorgenti, who had become president of ARCO Chemical in 1979, took early retirement in 1991, a move many industry analysts ascribed to the Channelview explosion. Privacy Policy. The facility -- in the south of the city, a few miles from Philadelphia International Airport -- is the 10th largest refinery in the United States and the largest oil refining complex on the Eastern Seaboard, Video captures moment of explosion at refinery, Why it's important to get a flu vaccine this year, Meet the head of the armed Black group demanding justice, Former Pence staffer says Marc Short used to joke about masks, CDC official sounded alarm on Covid-19 months ago. In 1993, the company introduced ethyl tertiary butyl ether (ETBE), a gasoline additive made from corn-based ethanol. Atlantic Richfield spun off part of ARCO Chemical in 1985 to create the Lyondell Petrochemical Corporation, another wholly owned subsidiary. Lyondell focused on developing commercial uses for olefins, a class of hydrocarbons that includes propylene, ethelyne, and butylenes, which had been a drain on ARCO Chemical's earnings. However, by the mid-1960s, Richfield still was producing only 50 percent of its own crude for refining, and in 1966, the company merged with Atlantic Refining to form Atlantic Richfield. ARCO Chemical also took a $56 million charge in 1993 to divest itself of a poorly performing joint venture in Korea. ARCO Chemical also launched a $1 billion expansion, which included opening petrochemical plants in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and Ciba, Japan. endobj Major chemicals include propylene oxide, used in a variety of plastics, foams, and paints; tertiary butyl alcohol, used in the production of oxygenated fuels that are blended with gasoline to reduce emissions and improve octane; and styrene, used in the production of insulation, foam cups, and engineering resins. Four employees also suffered minor injuries, and all were treated on-site by a company medical team, according to Philadelphia Energy Solutions. The tank was being repaired and the vapors apparently were ignited by a spark from equipment being used by maintenance workers. [We] had always prided ourselves on our technological expertise, which we certainly had. Authorities are working to account for all the personnel, Corley said -- though Murphy said no one who'd been at the facility is missing. The city's Department of Public Health Air Management Services Lab "is testing samples taken from up- and downwind of the refinery fire," according to James Garrow, spokesman for the department. x���_k�0�����ʚ�&M҂��8�V��sm)L�j���� *�K^���_�Iح�2��k�M��ř)$������H�2Ξ[��,=(֜!�n- �G�y���`Hc�K"�6gD�J��*��C@��a� ��bVd+�_ w(���p�@v:�� meP:�ДS�^J��L$�� ��e儳1(i�����T����g/�c��ˬ��������w�^Ut�ʨZm>�WH�9�{�q�z\bK�1��j-����������7�I��岀. The demand for propylene oxide grew rapidly--by the late 1970s, Oxirane was a $1 billion company in annual sales. Then, in 1967, Atlantic Richfield and Halcon International formed the Oxirane Chemical Company, an engineering design and consulting company that also engaged in research and development. The new standards will require the use of reformulated gasolines year-round in high-pollution urban areas. Copyright (c) 2019 Company-Histories.com. endobj <> The 1993 annual report quotes marketing manager Alex Blagojevic: 'We now have the ability to serve as a regular, large volume supplier of ETBE nearly two years before the (reformulated gasoline) requirement. 3 0 obj "Preliminary testing both at the site of the refinery and in the adjacent community has shown no ambient carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons (combustibles), or hydrogen sulfide," said Garrow. The following year, the company acquired majority interest in the Chiunglong Petrochemical Company in Taiwan and opened a chemical plant in Fos-sur-Mer, France. Philadelphia Energy Solutions reportedly is the largest oil refining complex on the Eastern Seaboard. Atlantic Richfield was founded in 1865 as the Atlantic Refining Company, and established the first refinery in the United States in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania that same year. In July 1990, an explosion at ARCO Chemical's petrochemical plant in Channelview, Texas, on the Houston Ship Channel, killed 17 workers and injured five others. However, despite the strong prospects for growth, ARCO Chemical failed to earn its dividend in 1993 for the third straight year. Hilco Redevelopment Partners has named an operations head to help oversee its planned 1,300-acre transformation of the former Philadelphia Energy Solutions refinery site in South Philadelphia … ... (ARCO… Two years later when the largest oil field in the Western Hemisphere was discovered at Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, the newly formed Atlantic Richfield was the largest federal leaseholder in the state. ARCO Chemical expects ETBE to be a key ingredient in reformulated gasolines when stricter U.S. automobile emission standards go into effect in 1995. 2 0 obj PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- The fire at the Philadelphia Energy Solutions Refining Complex Friday comes almost 44 years since a deadly refinery blaze in the city. <>/XObject<>/Font<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 720 405] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>> But we had expanded so rapidly in the middle to late 80s that I think the Channelview tragedy really made us stand back and say, 'We need to slow down our expansion, our building of new plants.'. Small fires were burning near the vat as well, Murphy said. Company headquarters were in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. 1982 –Gulf Oil is bought by Chevron, and the Girard Point refinery became the Chevron USA Philadelphia refinery. "It is safer if it burns itself out," Murphy said. The June 21 blaze at a Philadelphia refinery was likely caused by a faulty pipe, according to a preliminary report from the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board. Residents reported several explosions that were felt in South Jersey and Delaware County, Pennsylvania, according to. The extent of damage to the refinery wasn't clear early Friday, but it appeared to be confined to the vat area. The plant was shut down after the explosion and was not fully back in operation until January 1991--six months later. At the time, the company said it did 'not agree with all of the OSHA citations, but ... feels its interests are better served by focusing on improving work place safety' than challenging the charges. Atlantic Refining was swallowed by the Standard Oil Company in 1874, but reemerged as an independent company in 1911, when the Standard Oil Trust was broken up by the U.S. Supreme Court under the Sherman Antitrust Act. An investigation by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) indicated that the nighttime explosion occurred when flammable vapors built up inside an empty 900,000 gallon tank used to hold chemicals and wastewater for treatment. The ARCO Chemical Company manufactures intermediate chemicals used in a broad range of consumer and industrial products. In 1979, ARCO Chemical built the world's first chemical plant designed specifically to produce methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE), an additive used to replace lead and enhance the octane of oxygenated fuels. MTBE has been used primarily to reduce carbon monoxide during cold weather. By Jason Hanna, Madeline Holcombe and Joe Sutton, CNN. It was the second fire to occur at Philadelphia Energy Solutions this month. In 1957, Richfield, which had become a major producer of high-octane aviation fuel during World War II, became the first company to strike oil in Alaska, and eventually acquired leases on 2.5 million acres of federal land. (CNN)A large fire broke out early Friday at an oil refinery in Philadelphia, rattling the area with at least one booming explosion and lighting up the dark sky with huge balls of gas and flame. Principal Subsidiaries: ARCO Chemical Americas Company, Newtown Square, Pennsylvania; ARCO Chemical Europe, Inc. (England); ARCO Chemical Asia Pacific, Ltd. (Hong Kong). Eleven of those killed were maintenance workers. The refinery experienced another blaze on June 10, Philadelphia Fire Department spokeswoman Kathy Matheson told CNN. The Rio Grande Oil Company, which would become the Richfield Oil Company, was founded in 1915 at El Paso, Texas. stream learn how over 7,000 companies got started! 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