Summary of Criminal Prosecutions
W.D. Louisiana 2:11-CR-00227
W.D. Louisiana 2:11-CR-00130
W.D. Louisiana 2:11-CR-00266
In a joint factual statement filed in court, Pelican, headquartered in Houston, admitted that the company had knowingly committed criminal violations of its operating permit at the refinery located in Lake Charles, La. The violations were discovered during a March 2006 inspection by the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) and the EPA, which identified numerous unsafe operating conditions. Pelican also pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice for submitting materially false deviation reports to LDEQ, the agency that administers the federal Clean Air Act in Louisiana.
Pelican admitted to the following:
Pelican had no company budget, no environmental department and no environmental manager;
In order to comply with a permit issued under the Clean Air Act, the refinery was required to use certain key pollution prevention equipment, but that equipment was either not functioning, poorly maintained, improperly installed, improperly placed into service and/or improperly calibrated;
It was a routine practice for over a year to use an emergency flare gun to re-light the flare tower at the refinery designed to burn off toxic gases and provide for the safe combustion of potentially explosive chemicals; because the pilot light was not functioning properly, employees would take turns trying to shoot the flare gun to relight the explosive gasses;
Sour crude oil was stored in a tank that was not properly placed into service and remained in the tank after the roof sank;
A caustic scrubber designed to remove hydrogen sulfide from emissions was bypassed;
A continuous emission monitoring system (CEMS) designed to measure the hydrogen sulfide levels in refinery emissions was not working properly; and
Pelican provided false information to the states of Louisiana and Texas concerning the laboratory testing of asphalt.
The criminal investigation is being conducted by the EPA Criminal Investigation Division in Baton Rouge and the Louisiana State Police, with assistance from the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality. The case is being prosecuted by U.S. Attorney Finley, Senior Trial Attorney Richard A. Udell and Trial Attorney Christopher Hale of the Environmental Crimes Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
- Clean Air Act (CAA)
- Title 18 U.S. Criminal Code (TITLE 18)