Concerns are mounting about the growing petroleum coke (pet coke) piles along the Detroit River waterfront which now takes up an area equivalent to a city block, and rises three stories high. Although some of the pet coke is being sold as fuel, the amount being removed from the site daily does not equal how much is being trucked there from the refinery, and so the piles continue to grow.
Pet coke is a by-product of the refining heavy crude piped from the oil sands in Alberta and is being used by a Detroit refinery, Marathon Petroleum. It can be used as a low-cost fuel if the proper measures are put in place to control the release of sulfur it produces, although a number of developing countries use it since it is cheaper than coal. The black grainy material is high in carbon and also contains heavy metals like vanadium, selenium, and chromium.
The property upon which the piles sits is owned by a company called Detroit Bulk Storage, who is storing the pet coke for Koch Carbon. The companies storing the piles did not even apply for an open air storage permit for bulk materials, which is required even for harmless materials like gravel or sand; they are only now in the process of applying for those permits. Part of the delay in obtaining permits for the piles has arisen from the disconnect between the owner of the pet coke, the company Koch Carbon, and the storage facility, both parties claiming that the piles are the others’ responsibility.
The pet coke is trucked daily to the storage site where some of it is then transported by ship to Nova Scotia where it is being used as a cheaper alternative to natural gas fuel. An electrical power plant owned by Nova Scotia Power, is buying the pet coke from Koch Carbon. The province produces natural gas from offshore fields and burns the cleaner fuel in some of its plants, but last year Nova Scotia Power produced 59% of its power from coal and petroleum coke. The company’s executive vice president for operations has stated that the use of the pet coke was a decision motivated by the low price of the material and the savings that it could pass along to its customers.
Pet coke started to be produced in greater amounts at Marathon petroleum after they underwent a $2 billion upgrade last fall which allowed them to process heavy Canadian crude for the first time.
A number of concerns have been raised about storm water runoff when rain comes into contact with these huge piles, but it has been reported that the yard where the piles sit is asphalted to create an impermeable surface and slopes away from the river so that accumulated runoff will gather in one location so that it may be treated. That being said, there still remains the concerns regarding the black film that is now forming on nearby balconies and driveways: it is a nuisance that nearby residents are being forced to deal with.
Millions of dollars have been spent from private and public funding to clean up the Detroit River Front in recent years now, and now one of the first things that people see when they travel along the river front is these enormous black piles that are essentially waste. Every barrel of crude that comes out of the Alberta sands throws off between 60 and 130 pounds of pet-coke. With the growing reliance of the United States on Canadian oil, projects like other refineries are going to be refining this heavy crude. The Marathon refinery is still not at capacity at present, in fact they could handle two to three times more petroleum processing.
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