A power outage at an oil refinery in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, is the likely cause of a strange odor that was reported throughout Delaware, officials said.Officials told NBC10 there was an outage at Monroe Energy's Trainer refinery in Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, on Thursday at 6:30 a.m. After the outage, the systems at the facility went into safe shutdown mode, which caused an increased gas flare."As part of the shutdown, process gases are sent to our flare stack, which acts as a safety relief valve to reduce pressure....
A power outage at an oil refinery in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, is the likely cause of a strange odor that was reported throughout Delaware, officials said.
Officials told NBC10 there was an outage at Monroe Energy's Trainer refinery in Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, on Thursday at 6:30 a.m. After the outage, the systems at the facility went into safe shutdown mode, which caused an increased gas flare.
"As part of the shutdown, process gases are sent to our flare stack, which acts as a safety relief valve to reduce pressure. This resulted in visible flaring for about two hours," a Monroe Energy spokesperson wrote. "In addition to material being sent to the flare, process safety release valves opened on one of our crude units as designed, to reduce pressure. At that time, there was no noticeable smell at or in the vicinity of the facility."
Around 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, there were reports of a gas odor about 10 miles away from the facility in New Castle County, Delaware. Officials believe the odor from the gas flare traveled to New Castle County, Delaware.
Monroe Energy then activated a refinery air monitoring team who took air samples at the locations where there were reports of the odor. A spokesperson for the company said there were over 40 readings in multiple locations from Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, to Wilmington, Delaware. However, test results from the air samples did not show any risk to human health.
The Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) also monitored the air quality in the area. Monroe Energy is working with the DNREC, Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), Delaware County Local Emergency Planning Committee, Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, as well as local, county, state, and federal officials.
Since Thursday morning's incident, the refinery has been stable and there hasn't been any flaring for several hours, according to the Monroe Energy spokesperson.
"We sincerely apologize for any concern and inconvenience this unpleasant odor may have caused residents," the spokesperson wrote.
Wednesday night there were severe storms and flooding throughout the region, including Delaware. Officials have not yet confirmed if the power outage at the facility was caused by the weather, however.