Tag Archives: Hurricane Harvey

Houston Mayor Says Flooded City Ready for Business

News, , ,

Saying Labor Day is the deadline, Houston’s Mayor Sylvester Turner says his city, America’s fourth-most populated, will be “open for business” despite mandatory evacuations of flooded homes, billions of dollars in damage, and many parts of town still under water due to Hurricane Harvey, which made landfall in south east Texas on August 25th, 2017.

“Anyone who was planning on a conference or a convention or a sporting event or a concert coming to this city, you can still come,” the mayor said to CBS. “We can do multiple things at the same time.”

Officials are still worried about explosions at a chemical plant damaged by the hurricane, the country’s most devastating in ten years. To ease the danger of further explosions experts performed a controlled burn last Sunday of extremely volatile compounds at the Arkema facility in Crosby. After Harvey’s flooding knocked out generators three trailers caught fire.

The authorities stated that they are continuing to monitor the air quality within a mile and a half radius of the plant, which is outside Houston. People within the vicinity of the chemical plant have still not returned to their homes.

In addition, floodwaters have overcome at least five toxic waste Superfund locations close to Houston, with the possibility that some may have sustained damage. The Environmental Protection Agency has not yet assessed the full extent of the damage.

Hurricane Harvey Forces Closure of Largest US Oil Refinery

Commodities, , ,

The devastation wrought by Hurricane Harvey and its unprecedented flooding has forced several oil refineries to partially or completely close, including America’s largest. Harvey’s ferocious winds and rain forced the Motiva refinery in Port Arthur to close. The plant has the capacity for 603,000 barrels/day. According to the Wall Street Journal the refinery began closing operations at about 5am central time on Wednesday “in response to increasing local flood conditions.” The giant Saudi Arabian oil company Saudi Aramco is the owner of Motiva. Production of oil had already slowed to 60% of capacity on Tuesday.

As of Wednesday morning, about 18 refineries were at least partly closed in Texas, including those located at Port Arthur in Houston.

“The largest impact to energy markets is severe flooding, which has resulted in the closure or part-closure of nearly 25% of the United States’ refinery capacity,” analysts wrote.
“As Harvey heads inland once again, we note a number of refineries in its current trajectory will be under threat,” they added. “This could close up to another 824,000 barrels per day (b/d) of capacity, giving an additional lift to fuel prices, while further depressing crude.”

The hurricane has had more of an impact on refining than on production, which has caused a strange fluctuation in oil prices compared to gasoline prices, which have gone up compared to oil.

Usually oil prices climb in response to extreme weather that hits areas with high concentrations of oil businesses. But prices of oil have fallen recently: West Texas Intermediate crude oil was down 1.1%, at $45.94/barrel. But US gasoline futures went up to their highest level since July 2015.

As refineries close due to damage, or workers are unable to reach their jobs; or it becomes difficult or impossible to move the gasoline out, a lack of demand for oil is created. This leads to more oil in storage, waiting to be refined, thereby forcing prices down. At the same time refiners can’t produce and distribute gasoline and other refined oil products, lowering supply and forcing prices up.

This explains why, when usually the price of oil and gas go up and down together, the unique circumstances caused by Hurricane Harvey has caused oil and gasoline prices to travel independently and in opposite directions.