MEDIA RELEASE
National Refinery Reform Campaign
For immediate release
April 20, 2005

(New Orleans, LA - Port Arthur, TX - Toledo, OH) Local, state and national oil refinery watchdog groups will join together with the Earth Day Network to hold a series of events focused on educating and organizing refinery communities to gather evidence during refinery accidents in order to achieve better enforcement by the US EPA. The groups will distribute 10,000 specially designed brochures entitled “10 Simple Things You Can Do When the Refinery Has an Accident” in Texas, Louisiana and Ohio.

The groups will engage in a series of Earth Day activities that include:

• Launch of a real time toxics air monitoring available on the web downwind of the ExxonMobil Refinery in Chalmette, Louisiana (www.airmonitorchalmette.com)
• 'Air Fairs' in Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas, will train refinery neighbors to take air samples and organize for upcoming refinery permit challenges
• Delivery of a list of demands on frequent accidents at the troubled Sunoco refinery will be delivered in Toledo by neighbors to the management

The "10 Simple Things" refinery brochures include information on immediate action that refinery neighbors can take to ask the right questions and get the real answers on chemicals released from refineries and their health effects. It also suggests long term action refinery neighbors and groups can take to seek reform of refinery operations and regulations. Finally, the brochure restates that demands that dozens of refinery communities have been making to the US EPA on reforms the agency should take to enforce existing law. Copies of the brochure are available at www.refineryreform.org.

The groups in Ohio, Louisiana and Texas are part of a national campaign that has been demanding a series of reforms from the US EPA with regard to refinery policies and enforcement. These demands include:

• Enforce the Law
  While some refiners have settled violations, others including Exxon-Mobil and Sunoco continue to ignore our environmental laws, and the US EPA has yet to take these companies to court.
• Stop "Accidental" Pollution
  Refiners should be held responsible for pollution from repeated accidents, startups and shutdowns, and required to design and operate their plants more safely.
• Tell the Truth About Air Pollution
  We have the right to know how much and what kind of air pollution refiners release to our neighborhoods, and how it affects our health. Air emissions from refineries are underreported, or not reported at all, and too difficult for the public to understand.
• Stop Rubber-Stamping Permits
  Refiners should not receive new permits if they are violating environmental laws, and communities should be given a meaningful chance to review permit applications. EPA should stop conspiring with industry lobbyists to wipe out New Source Review and requirements that make refiners update pollution controls when they expand or modify plants.
• Require Refiners to Become Good Neighbors
  Refiners ought to help support the cost of monitoring for air contaminants in our neighborhoods, maintain emergency warning systems that work, provide health care to victims of air pollution and support independent experts to recommend pollution prevention improvements at the refinery.

The refinery watchdog groups are part of a national effort that has been seeking a meeting with the Administrator of the US EPA to discuss the requested reforms. To date, the US EPA has refused to grant such a meeting.

Information on the activities of the groups are available on their web sites at: www.ohiocitizen.org, www.refineryreform.org, www.labucketbrigade.org, www.earthday.net.