{"id":263013,"date":"2026-04-23T17:22:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T17:22:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/263013\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T17:22:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T17:22:07","slug":"benzene-emissions-on-texas-gulf-coast-among-nations-highest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/263013\/","title":{"rendered":"Benzene emissions on Texas Gulf Coast among nation\u2019s highest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Audio recording is automated for accessibility. Humans wrote and edited the story. See our AI policy<\/a>, and give us feedback<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The nonprofit publication Capital & Main produced this\u00a0article<\/a>. It is co-published with permission.<\/p>\n

Daylight hadn\u2019t yet slipped from the sky above Port Arthur when the residents felt the ground shake. They quickly moved inside, shut windows and closed doors, sheltering in place until they got word that the explosion at the Valero Port Arthur Refinery was under control.<\/p>\n

The ensuing fire, which polluted the community in a black chemical plume in late March, burned for nearly 10 hours and released chemicals<\/a> into the air for over 10 days.<\/p>\n

Incidents like this one are not uncommon for residents in Port Arthur, a Texas Gulf town wedged at the border between Texas and Louisiana. Of the 131 oil refineries<\/a> in the United States, more than a quarter of them are in Texas and most line the Gulf Coast. Communities like Port Arthur, which sit on the industry\u2019s fenceline, get the brunt of the pollution \u2014 including a highly hazardous and carcinogenic chemical found in crude oil and gas called benzene.<\/p>\n

Texas refineries have historically generated some of the highest rates of benzene emissions in the country. An Environmental Defense Fund report<\/a>, published this month in the journal Environmental Research Letters, found that from 2018 to 2023, refineries in Texas produced some of the highest emissions on average compared to those in other states. <\/p>\n

Further, the data, which was collected from air monitoring stations surrounding the facilities through the EPA\u2019s 2015 Petroleum Refinery Sector Rule<\/a>, revealed that rates of benzene emissions had little to do with the size or crude oil capacity of the refineries. Rather, researchers found that these emissions were far more dependent on state policy and facilities failing to address recurring or persistent leaks. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn theory, capacity might explain some of the differences, but actually it\u2019s not strongly associated with the amount of refinery benzene that was measured at the fenceline,\u201d said Dan Peters, data scientist for the Environmental Defense Fund. \u201cSo it points to other factors that seem to be more important than just the refining activity itself.\u201c<\/p>\n

By their nature, refineries emit a laundry list of harmful air pollutants, including greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane, as well as volatile organic compounds such as hydrogen sulfide, sulfur dioxide and benzene. However, refineries often emit much higher levels of these chemicals through leaks, explosions or fires. The incident at Port Arthur is one such example \u2014 leaking chemicals<\/a> like butane, propane and benzene. <\/p>\n

There are federal regulations to address refinery pollution through the Clean Air Act, but much of the enforcement falls to the state, said Peters. Further, in his second term in office, President Donald Trump and his administration have rolled back numerous Clean Air Act protections, granting widespread exemptions for the fossil fuel industry. <\/p>\n

The Petroleum Rule has remained untouched so far, but the Trump administration has exempted the industry from similar rules<\/a> in the past year. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe do know that states play a really major role in enforcing regulations,\u201d Peters said. \u201cThey\u2019re responsible for overseeing the Clean Air Act and for permitting for many of the enforcement activities. Some states just have additional regulations.\u201d <\/p>\n

Benzene monitoring <\/p>\n

In 2015, the Environmental Protection Agency passed the Petroleum Refinery Sector Rule<\/a> to better track and regulate rogue emissions from refineries. One part of the rule required all refineries in the United States to begin monitoring benzene levels around their facility perimeters.<\/p>\n

Armed with this data, Peters and a team at EDF analyzed such benzene emissions from 2018 to 2023 and found that levels across the country dropped over time. Despite the decrease, Texas and Louisiana still had an average of five times the levels of benzene than refineries in California and Washington state. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we noticed were there were these persistent disparities between states that lasted over time and persisted through the end of our data in 2023 even though there was a significant decrease overall nationally,\u201d Peters said. \u201cTexas did go down, but it\u2019s still much higher than the other states.\u201d <\/p>\n

Of the 119 refineries Peters studied, nine of the 20 worst benzene polluters were in Texas. TotalEnergies Refinery \u2014 another facility in Port Arthur \u2014 had the third highest levels of benzene in the country, according to data. Navajo Refining \u2014 an oil refinery in Eddy County, New Mexico \u2014 is the biggest offender on the list. <\/p>\n

When analyzing the numbers at the facility level, TotalEnergies had nearly nine times the benzene emissions compared to the largest refinery in California \u2014 Marathon Los Angeles \u2014 even though TotalEnergies has a much lower crude oil capacity than Marathon. <\/p>\n

While Marathon processed an average of 364,333 barrels of crude per day from 2018 to 2023, the facility emitted an average of 1.8 micrograms of benzene per cubic meter at the fenceline. TotalEnergies processes 120,000 less \u2014 245,000 barrels a day \u2014 and emits an average of 18 micrograms per cubic meter at the fenceline, the data showed.<\/p>\n

The EPA action level for fenceline benzene emissions is 9 micrograms per cubic meter<\/a>. That means that anything above that limit is harmful for communities, and facilities must address the issue immediately. <\/p>\n

In a statement, TotalEnergies said the company has \u201ctaken significant steps, including dedicating teams, following new processes and making multi-million-dollar investments, to reduce benzene emissions\u201d and added that the overall annual average for benzene at the Port Arthur facility is currently 6.43 micrograms per cubic meter. <\/p>\n

Navajo Refining did not respond to requests for comment from Capital & Main. <\/p>\n

The results were not surprising to Shiv Srivastava, policy director for Fenceline Watch, a Houston-based environmental justice organization. Chemicals such as benzene are released<\/a> into the communities around the petrochemical industry regularly, but community members often do not know the extent of the pollution, said Srivastava.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur communities in Houston have a very unique exposure rate simply because of the density of infrastructure that is co-located in our communities,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not a question of if (the facilities) are going to explode or leak or flare, but a question simply when.\u201d <\/p>\n

Benzene, a colorless and volatile liquid with a range of acute health effects, is among the top 20 most produced chemicals<\/a> by quantity in the United States. It\u2019s found in the emissions from burning coal, exhaust from vehicles, industrial solvents, gas stations and refineries. Residents have described the odor as thickly sweet \u2014 like the smell at a gas station pump. <\/p>\n

Srivastava pointed to a 2019 tank fire at the Intercontinental Terminal Company in the community of Deer Park near Houston that burned for three days. After officials lifted the shelter-in-place order, air pollution from benzene<\/a> lasted weeks. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not just an immediate impact, but a multigenerational toxic harm that we experience because of emissions like benzene and all of these other petrochemicals,\u201d Srivastava said.<\/p>\n

From monitoring to enforcement<\/p>\n

The data collected across the country through the Petroleum Refinery Sector Rule is the first of its kind to be gathered using the same procedures at every facility in the country. Every two weeks, the data is analyzed at a lab and then submitted to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the EPA, Peters said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn theory, if you have the monitoring data, the first time you get that high result, you can see that something is happening over at that side of the facility,\u201d he said. \u201cSo if you\u2019re proactive, there\u2019s an opportunity to address that before it happens again.\u201d <\/p>\n

However, Peters found that even after facilities were alerted to high levels of benzene, it didn\u2019t always mean that operators successfully addressed the root cause of the pollution. The data showed that some monitors surrounding the facility would light up more frequently with higher levels of benzene, indicating that the issues were persistent or ongoing. <\/p>\n

Inyang Uwak, environmental epidemiologist and research and policy director for Air Alliance Houston, said the finding falls in line with trends in state enforcement. <\/p>\n

\u201cTexas should be taking a more strategic effort to monitor for this hazardous air pollutant in communities that are close to industry,\u201d Uwak said. \u201cWhen you get the data, the next thing to do is investigate.\u201d <\/p>\n

Communities have for years had little trust<\/a> in the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to handle issues with industrial pollution. In 2025, the commission worked through only 39 complaints in a backlog of 1,432 cases, according to a new report<\/a> from Public Citizen, a nonprofit advocacy organization. Of the over 9,000 new complaints the agency received that year, more than half took at least 30 days to investigate and 30% were closed without an investigation, the report showed. <\/p>\n

In response, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality said that complaints\u2019 response time is prioritized by \u201crelative threat to public health, safety or the environment\u201d and many complaints were sent to other agencies because they \u201care not within the TCEQ\u2019s jurisdiction.\u201d <\/p>\n

Additionally, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality weakened<\/a> the long-term air pollution guideline two decades ago. Today, Texas\u2019 long-term exposure limit for benzene is 1.4 parts per billion, while in other states, the limit is much lower. For example, the exposure limit<\/a> in Minnesota is 0.24 parts per billion and 0.03 parts per billion<\/a> in Massachusetts. <\/p>\n

Long-term exposure to benzene leads to serious and harmful effects<\/a> such as immune disorders and cancer. In one case, the state of Texas published data<\/a> in 2025 for Channelview \u2014 another fenceline community near Houston \u2014 showing that rates were \u201csignificantly greater than expected\u201d for leukemia, lymphoma and other cancers. The community is also known to have high levels of benzene. <\/p>\n

Peters said communities shouldn\u2019t have to live like this. The findings, he said, emphasized that pollution is not actually inevitable. <\/p>\n

\u201cFacilities are already capable of operating much more cleanly because we can see that some of them are already doing it,\u201d Peters said. \u201cThese facilities could be doing much better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Disclosure: Air Alliance Houston and Environmental Defense Fund have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune\u2019s journalism. Find a complete\u00a0list of them here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Audio recording is automated for accessibility. Humans wrote and edited the story. See our AI policy, and give…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263014,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7285,6084,84873,27,56515,29,28],"class_list":["post-263013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-environmental-protection-agency","tag-oil-and-natural-gas","tag-port-arthur","tag-texas","tag-texas-commission-on-environmental-quality-tceq","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263013\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}