Environmental Compliance in Refining

Petroleum refineries have made a significant contribution to the steady improvement in air quality in the United States since the 1970s. Altogether, cleaner cars powered by cleaner fuels produced by refineries and cleaner petroleum industry facilities account for about 71 percent of total emission reductions in the U.S. between 1970 and 1997. Between 1980 and 1998, U.S. petroleum refineries reduced their air emissions by 75%. In that same timeframe, the U.S. petroleum industry spent almost $83 billion dollars on the environment, including about $8.5 billion in 1998. Spending in 1998 was more than EPA’s total budget and more than double the net income of the top 200 oil and natural gas companies. The refining sector has typically been responsible for half or more of the industry’s environmental expenditures. In 1996, over 120 EPA regulations applied to refineries, and since 1996 the number has been rapidly growing.