A new report from an environmental group charges that refineries across the country routinely exceed pollution limits because air quality regulators overlook episodic releases that occur when equipment breaks down or is shut down for maintenance.
Bay Area refineries are among those that exceed pollution limits, said Kelly Haragan, an attorney for the Washington-based Environmental Integrity Project.
But, she said, it was impossible to tell by how much because the Bay Area Air Quality Management District refused to turn over pollution data.
"In the Bay Area, there was just too much missing information," Haragan said.
The group called on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to voluntarily close regulatory loopholes, but said it was prepared to go to court to force the EPA to crack down on refineries and other industrial sources of air pollution.
The Environmental Integrity Project was started by Eric Schaeffer, who was the EPA's head of enforcement until he quit in 2002 in protest over Bush officials' enforcement of environmental laws.
At issue in the report, released Wednesday, are refinery "upsets," or disruptions in normal operations that require refinery operators to dispose of gas through flares or vents. This can happen during malfunctions or when refineries are shut down or restarted.
The report charged that many upsets could be avoided if refineries invested in more equipment.
Haragan said upsets have a severe impact on air quality in areas near refineries, areas that she said see more cases of cancer, asthma and other health problems.
"It's obvious that something is wrong, and we think those upsets are part of the problem," Haragan said. "That's a lot of emissions that are coming out that are a routine part of doing business. ... We think it's time they (EPA) stepped in and did something about it."
The EPA issued a statement defending its approach to refinery upsets. "Facilities are required to report and plan to minimize the over-limit emissions, whether they result from startup, shutdown or maintenance," the EPA said.
The National Petrochemical and Refiners Association criticized the report and said toxic emissions have declined in recent years.
Marilyn Bardet, a Benicia refinery activist, said air regulators should make more information available about refinery emissions. "It's what you can't see or smell that is really worrisome," Bardet said. "The public has no way of knowing what is being released."
The Bay Area air district last year passed new regulations that are expected to eventually make available more information about flare emissions.
The San Francisco-based agency withheld reports from the environmental group because those reports were being reviewed for possible enforcement actions. In addition, some reports could not be found or were in corrupted computer files, the environmental group said.
Peter Hess, the air district's assistant air pollution control officer, said the fact that the reports were being reviewed by staff lawyers showed the district was determined to penalize refineries and other industries that overpollute.
But he acknowledged that the lack of publicly available information about refinery pollution is a problem.
"That's how we were doing business back then," he said of reports from 2001 and 2002 that are still in the legal department.
Last year, the district passed rules requiring that refineries monitor and report emissions from flares; that data eventually will be posted to the Web.
Two weeks ago, however, the air district's public affairs office refused a request from the Times for those reports. The newspaper has since filed a request for the records under the state public records law.
