Exxon’s Texas Complex Spews Fire, Prompting Shelter Warning

(Bloomberg) -- Exxon Mobil Corp.’s suburban Houston refining and chemicals complex erupted in flames on Wednesday, prompting municipal leaders to order residents to seek shelter indoors, shut their windows and turn off air conditioners.

Orange flames and thick, black smoke began pouring from an olefins unit in the plant around 11 a.m. Central time in the city of Baytown, Texas. About 37 people suffered injuries, mostly minor burns, Jason Duncan, olefins manager at the site, said during a media briefing. The shelter-in-place order was lifted after abut four hours because no toxic fumes were detected.

The fire has the potential to cripple Exxon’s U.S. chemical business, 45% of which is concentrated at the Baytown complex, according to Wood Mackenzie Ltd. Exxon hasn’t publicly estimated the business impacts of the blaze. Because the refining and chemicals units are deeply intertwined, the incident also has the potential to disrupt fuel production at the facility.

“The duration and magnitude of the market impact will be determined by the extent of the damage and what units and chemical value chains are affected,” John Maselli, an analyst at Wood Mackenzie, said in a statement.

The incident comes four months after a fire at chemical storage complex in the nearby suburb of Deer Park blackened the skies for four days and triggered benzene plumes that paralyzed cities, schools and traffic. The disaster at Intercontinental Terminals Co. spewed dangerous chemicals into the Houston Ship Channel, shutting one of North America’s most important industrial thoroughfares for days.

“Today’s chemical explosion at the Exxon Mobil plant in Baytown is just the latest in an endless list of hazardous incidents that Houston-area communities have been forced to endure,” Adrian Shelley, director of Public Citizen’s Texas office, said in a statement. “It’s time for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the EPA to get serious about preventing these dangerous fires.”

Exxon’s Baytown facility is 24 miles (39 kilometers) from downtown Houston, on the eastern bank of a heavily trafficked waterway that connects the ship channel to Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico.

The complex, which covers an area four times the size of New York’s Central Park, caught fire on March 16 and again on June 6. The olefins unit processes petroleum byproducts into the building blocks of plastics, detergents and rubber.

--With assistance from Rachel Adams-Heard.

To contact the reporter on this story: Andres Guerra Luz in Houston at aluz8@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Simon Casey at scasey4@bloomberg.net, Joe Carroll, Steven Frank

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