Chevron agrees to $7 million Clean Air settlement

August 23, 2000
Web posted at: 4:00 PM EDT (2000 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Oil giant Chevron has agreed to pay a $6 million fine and make environmental improvements valued at another $1 million. The settlement is in response to federal charges that the firm violated the Clean Air Act at its El Segundo, California, offshore loading terminal.

The joint announcement by the Justice Department and Environmental Protection Agency said the settlement set a record as the largest penalty ever paid under the Clean Air Act for a single facility.

The agreement was filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. The settlement and consent decree are subject to final court approval after a 30 day public comment period.

The deal requires Chevron to pay $500,000 to help build and operate a health clinic in Wilmington, California, to diagnose and treat respiratory diseases. The facility will provide medical care to people in the area who have experienced health problems that can be traced to air pollution.

"Our citizens are entitled to breathe clean air and compliance with the Clean Air Act is not optional," said Assistant Attorney General Lois Schiffer at the Justice Department.

Chevron has also agreed to spend $500,000 to install leakless valves and double-sealed pumps at its El Segundo refinery.

"People who live in the vicinity of the terminal will literally be able to breathe easier from now on," said EPA enforcement chief Steve Herman.

Under the settlement Chevron is prohibited from using its marine terminal until the EPA and Chevron agree on a plan to keep air emissions so low that they are not required to be controlled. Until then, the oil company will conduct its petroleum loading operations at a third party's marine terminals which have the proper emission control equipment.

To reduce harmful emissions, California regulations required companies as of 1995 to achieve a 95-percent reduction in emissions from marine terminals. However, the Justice Department said Chevron's own records show that from 1995 to 1998 the El Segundo facility did not use the pollution-control technology required by the regulations.

The Justice Department filed suit in 1999, two years after the nonprofit Communities for a Better Environment filed suit against Chevron. Both suits alleged that vapors known as volatile organic compounds (VOC's) escaped into the atmosphere as petroleum products were transferred to marine vessels from underwater pipelines connected to the Chevron refinery.

The Clean Air Act regulates VOC's because they directly contribute to smog, which aggravates respiratory diseases such as asthma, particularly in children and the elderly.

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