BP PLC — Audit Report / Information 2005

Dec 9, 2005

News Details

Ad-hoc | 9 December 2005 19:08

BP p.l.c.: Texas City Final Report – part 2 of 2

Texas City Final Report BP p.l.c.: Texas City Final Report – part 2 of 2 Ad hoc announcement processed and transmitted by DGAP. The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement. —————————————————————————— part 2 of 2 Notes to Editors – BP has accepted responsibility for the March 23 explosion and for the management system failures and employee mistakes which contributed to or caused the explosion. – The company has set aside $700 million to compensate victims of the explosion and has worked to resolve claims arising from the incident. Settlements have been achieved with the families of most of the workers who died and with many workers who suffered serious injuries. – BP has entered a settlement with the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration resolving more than 300 separate alleged violations of OSHA safety regulations. BP paid a fine of $21.3 million. The company agreed to a number of corrective actions, including the hiring and placement of process safety and organizational experts at the refinery. Under the agreement, BP does not admit the alleged violations or agree with the way OSHA has characterized them. – BP continues to cooperate with the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality regarding the Texas City explosion and related concerns. – On the recommendation of the CSB, BP has voluntarily appointed an independent panel to assess and make recommendations for improvement of safety management and safety culture at the company’s five U.S. refineries. Former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker is chairman of the panel. – BP has endorsed a CSB recommendation urging the industry to revisit existing standards for the use of temporary buildings inside refineries and other processing plants. BP has established a new standard for its refining operations and plans to share it with others in industry. – The Texas City refinery is owned and operated by BP Products North America Inc. It is BP’s largest and most complex refinery with a rated capacity of 460,000 barrels per day and an ability to produce up to 11 million US gallons of gasoline per day. – The Isomerization (ISOM) unit is used to convert raffinate, a low octane blending feed, into higher octane components for unleaded regular gasoline. The unit has four sections including a splitter which takes raffinate and fractionates it into light and heavy components. The splitter consists of a surge drum, fired heater reboiler and a fractionating column 164 feet tall (50 metres). Description of incident The explosion and fire occurred after personnel responsible for the startup greatly overfilled the raffinate splitter tower and overheated its contents, which resulted in over pressuring of its relief valves. Liquid was pumped into the tower for almost three hours without any liquid being removed or any action taken to achieve the lower liquid level mandated by the startup procedure. The liquid level in the tower just prior to the loss of containment was at least 20 times higher than it should have been. Activation of the automatic liquid level control, as mandated in the startup procedure, would have prevented this occurring. A decision late in the start up to begin removing liquid from the tower exacerbated the incident. Rapid heat exchange between the over heated liquid being removed from the bottom of the tower and the liquid feed continuing to flow into the tower (the two streams pass through a heat exchanger) caused significant vapor generation as the feed entered the tower. Vaporization of the liquid feed low in the tower pushed liquid up the tower and out of the unit, over pressuring the relief valves and ultimately overwhelming the adjacent blow down unit. Based on process modeling, the investigation team estimates that about 1,100 barrels of liquid was discharged to the blow down unit which has a capacity of 390 barrels. Most of the liquid was released into the petroleum sewer system. An estimated 50 barrels overflowed the tower and led to the formation of a hydrocarbon vapor cloud at ground level. Based on inspection of the sewer system and process and explosion modeling, the investigation team concluded that the sewers were not the primary route for the formation of the hydrocarbon vapor cloud that subsequently exploded. The damage observed to the sewer system was the result of secondary fires caused by the main explosion. The source of ignition is not known. Unit supervisors were absent from the scene during critical parts of the startup and unit operators failed to take effective action to control the process upset or to sound evacuation alarms after the pressure relief valves opened. Critical factors The final report confirms the critical factors which led to the explosion and greatly increased its consequences. Those critical factors, which were described in the interim investigation report issued May 17 are: – The failure to follow procedures, leading to greatly overfilling the raffinate splitter tower – Venting of liquids caused by overfilling and over heating of the liquid in the tower leading to a liquid relief to atmosphere and the subsequent explosion – The location of many people too close to the source of relief (a blow down unit), congregated in and around temporary trailers which were inappropriately sited – The continued use of a blow down unit for light-end hydrocarbon use when inherently safer options were available and could have been installed. For further information contact: Ronnie Chappell, BP Press Office, Houston: 281-366-5174 end of part 2 BP p.l.c. 1 St James’s Square London, SW1Y 4PD United Kingdom ISIN: GB0007980591 WKN: 850517 Listed: Amtlicher Markt in Düsseldorf (Dt. Zertifikate DE0008618737), Frankfurt (General Standard) und Hamburg; Freiverkehr in Berlin-Bremen, Hamburg, Hannover, München und Stuttgart; Swiss Exchange End of ad hoc announcement (c)DGAP 09.12.2005