Fire Erupts At Large Chevron Refinery In California

A fire broke out at Chevron’s El Segundo refinery in California on Tuesday evening, with no injuries reported and no immediately clear indication as to the cause of the incident.

At around 6:15 p.m. on Tuesday, El Segundo Fire Department responded to an isolated fire inside the Chevron El Segundo Refinery, the city of El Segundo said. El Segundo and Manhattan Beach Fire Departments remained on scene alongside the Chevron Fire Department. After some two hours, the fire was extinguished, and “There was no offsite impact or public threat,” the city of El Segundo said.   

The El Segundo Refinery, capable of processing 290,000 barrels of crude oil per day (bpd), supplies 20 percent of all motor vehicle fuels and 40 percent of the jet fuel consumed in Southern California, Chevron says. 

The fire at the Chevron facility came after many of California’s refineries were partially down in October due to planned maintenance work. Last month, due to the planned overhauls at units, California’s gasoline prices spiked. Some parts of California saw gasoline prices surge to $8 per gallon as supply declined amid still robust demand, San Francisco Chronicle reported.

As of November 9, the average gasoline price across California is $5.453 per gallon, compared to a national average of $3.805/gal, according to AAA data. A month ago, at the height of the refinery outages, the average gasoline price in the state of California was $6.335/gallon. 

California’s Governor Gavin Newsom said last month he would call a special legislative session in December to discuss high gasoline prices and a proposal to slap a windfall tax on oil firms’ profits.

“We’re not going to stand by while greedy oil companies fleece Californians. Instead, I’m calling for a windfall tax to ensure excess oil profits go back to help millions of Californians who are getting ripped off,” Governor Newsom said at the end of September. 

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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