Reducing Environmental Impact to Air, Water & Land

Chevron's Pascagoula Refinery waste minimization initiatives to reduce air and water emissions and solid waste go back to 1987 when the Refinery was a leading participant in a corporate-wide strategy to reduce toxic emissions and costs. Chevron’s voluntary SMART (Save Money and Reduce Toxics) program received national acclaim as a model for other corporations.

Since 1988, the Pascagoula Refinery has focused emission control efforts on chemicals that represent the greatest potential risk to human health and the environment.

Today, the refinery continues to employ effective measures to reduce emissions, including leak detection and repair, recycling, adding secondary seals to many tanks, as well as installing new pollution-control equipment and technology. Additionally, process changes that reduce severity of operating conditions, like temperature and pressure, also contributed to emissions reductions.

Reducing Chemical Emissions

Refinery emissions of SARA or TRI chemicals continue to decrease since 1988 (baseline year), despite these facts:

• The refinery’s Production Index, a measurement of rated throughput and complexity, has increased approximately 40 percent since the 1988 baseline year, primarily due to the construction of three new petrochemical plants and the expansion of the refinery’s Aromatics complex.
• The Environmental Protection Agency nearly doubled its list of reportable SARA (or TRI) chemicals since 1988 (baseline year).

In 2003, the refinery’s waste minimization efforts resulted in these significant emission reductions:

• SARA (or TRI) emissions were 55 percent lower compared to the 1988 baseline year emissions. After adjusting for the Refinery Production Index, these emissions decreased 67 percent since 1988.
• Emissions classified as carcinogenic were 85 percent lower compared to 1988 (baseline year). Initiatives, including recycling spent nickel catalyst, and recycling recovered nickel from wastewater prior to discharge, account for continued decline in these type emissions.

Reducing Hazardous and Non-Hazardous Waste

The refinery continues to employ new technology and procedures that reduce waste generation or recover waste and transform it into useful products.

We reduce waste by decreasing waste sources, recycling waste, using less hazardous materials and treating waste inside the refinery. These initiatives have proved effective.

• The refinery's annual generation of hazardous waste in 2003 decreased by 50 percent compared to the 1991 baseline year. This reduction occurred despite the recent inclusion of four Refinery waste streams that had not been designated as hazardous by the EPA in 1991. Refinery initiatives contributing to reductions in hazardous waste generation included the segregation of benzene wastewater streams, and recycling and reclaiming petroleum products from recovered oil in our effluent treating plants.
• The refinery's annual generation of non-hazardous waste in 2003, increased 11 percent compared to the 1991 baseline year figure., In 2003 the refinery completed construction of the Clean Fuels Project. This project resulted in the refinery producing cleaner burning, lower sulfur content diesel fuel and gasoline. The project generated large amounts of construction debris and trash from removal of concrete slabs, pipes and vessels. There was insulation discarded from pipes. The extra people working at the site during the year generated more garbage and trash. This is not a sustainable increase.

Other Refinery Recycling Activities

Following are the results of a number of the Pascagoula Refinery's 2003 recovery and recycling initiatives.

• 800,000 barrels (120,000 tons) of oil recovered from process water and recycled back into the process units for conversion to salable products
• Process by-product gas treated to remove 99.96 percent of its hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and used as fuel gas, replacing natural gas purchases equivalent to 30 billion standard cubic feet
• 150 billion gallons of cooling water re-circulated through the Refinery processes
• 2.5 billion gallons of condensate recovered from the Refinery steam system and reused as boiler feed water
• 250 million gallons of sour process water treated to recover 15,000 tons ammonia and 341,000 tons of sulfur (both chemicals are sold to fertilizer manufacturers)
• Carbon dioxide (CO2), a byproduct of manufacturing hydrogen (H2) from natural gas, used in the effluent system for pH control, replacing purchased chemicals
• 3,000 tons of spent catalyst recycled through metallurgical smelters to recover the metals for reuse in the steel and copper industry
• 3,300 tons of scrap metal from demolition activities recycled
• 40 tons of white paper, along with cardboard and scrap wood, separated from Refinery garbage and trash and routed to recycling

We welcome comments and questions about our environmental record and policy. Contact us by email at pasms@chevron.com.

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