Refineries, plants shut amid Hurricane Harvey rains, floods

(adds Ascend ACN force majeure, American Acryl plant shutdown, Phillips 66 refinery shutdown, Valero refinery shutdown)

HOUSTON (ICIS)–Severe weather, heavy rain and flooding from Hurricane Harvey are now major concerns for the US Gulf Coast, the nation’s hub for refineries and petrochemical plants.

Several more companies have shut down plants as precautionary measures to Harvey impacts or have had production issues as a result of severe weather and flooding:

-Ascend declares force majeure on Chocolate Bayou acrylonitrile (ACN), hydrogen cyanide (HCN) and disodium iminodiacetate (DSIDA)
-American Acryl Bayport shuts acrylic acid
-Celanese shuts Pasadena methanol
-Chevron Phillips Chemical (CP Chem) shuts Cedar Bayou olefins and derivatives
-ExxonMobil shuts Baytown refinery and chemicals plant
-Flint Hills Resources flares at Houston propane dehydrogentation (PDH)
-Indorama unit trips at Clear Lake ethylene oxide
-INEOS has upset at Chocolate Bayou olefins 1 and 2
-Petrobras shuts Pasadena refinery
-Phillips 66 shuts Sweeny refinery
-Phillips 66 shuts Pasadena refined products terminal
-Shell shuts Deer Park refinery and chemicals plant
-TPC boilers trip at Houston butadiene (BD) site

Previously, the port of Corpus Christi closed on Friday in preparation for the storm. The US Coast Guard (USCG) reported several ports along the Texas coast as closed.

Source: USCG

Phillips 66 suspended operations at its Freeport terminal – which includes it new liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) export terminal – as a result of Port Freeport closing, although its other US Gulf assets continue to operate normally while implementing hurricane preparation plans.

Other refineries and chemical plants have shut down in preparation for Harvey:
-Braskem Seadrift polypropylene (PP)
-Citgo Corpus Christi refinery
-Enterprise Shoup gas processing plant and fractionator
-Dow Seadrift operations
-Flint Hills Corpus Christi refinery east and west
-Formosa Plastics Point Comfort olefins 1 and olefins 2
-INEOS Green Lake acrylonitrile
-INVISTA Victoria nylon intermediates
-Javelina Corpus Christi gas processing plant
-OxyChem Ingleside ethylene and chlor-alkali
-Valero Corpus Christi refineries
-Valero Three Rivers refinery

Meanwhile:
-LyondellBasell is conducting preparations at its Corpus Christi olefins plant. Sources said the producer has scaled back operations at its Houston refinery.
-DuPont is down at its Victoria site for a previously planned outage. It will commence start-up activities when the weather improves.
-INEOS discovered a heat exchanger tube leak at its Pasadena site. Repairs are unable to commence until weather risks pass.
-Liquefied natural gas (LNG) export construction sites are also on alert.

To view an interactive map of petrochemical plants in Texas, click here. Use the drop-down menu to see plants by products, and zoom in to see more details.

Pictured above: Vehicles are submerged in the greater Houston area as the Hurricane Harvey made its landfall over the Texas Gulf Coast Friday night. (Source: Xinhua News Agency/REX/Shutterstock)