Bay City News
After they were caught dumping oil refinery waste into the Bay and sued by an environmental watchdog nonprofit, oil company Valero and shipping operator Amports agreed Monday to settle for $2.38 million.
As part of the settlement, the companies with operations at the Port of Benicia have also agreed to share maintenance records, shipping schedules, surveillance footage, and other data with San Francisco Baykeeper, the nonprofit that brought the suit forward in 2022 after gathering drone footage evidence.
Sejal Choksi-Chugh, Baykeeper executive director, described the investigation her team began in 2019 after receiving tips through the nonprofit's pollution hotline. She said community members crossing the Carquinez Bridge had initially witnessed the dumping of what was suspected to be petroleum coke (petcoke) -- a refinery waste product that potentially contains pollutants regulated under the Clean Water Act -- into the Carquinez Strait at the Port of Benicia.
"The drones were really the key here," she said, noting the drones were donated to Baykeeper in 2020. "Usually, we're on our boats, and we investigate sites we believe are polluting, but we couldn't actually see anything from the water. And then, we went out and did a stakeout, but we couldn't really see anything from the land side either."
Between November 2020 and October 2021, Baykeeper investigators used their new drones to capture black plumes of petcoke in the water around the ships. They also documented clouds of petcoke dust rising off the port's conveyor belts.
"(The companies) were being negligent and just not caring that this was getting into the water and into the community, and that's a huge problem," Choksi-Chugh continued. "They really should be maintaining their equipment to make sure that this doesn't get into the water, into the air. They should be making sure that they're using state-of-the-art equipment."
In addition to sharing data with Baykeeper for at least three years, the settlement further requires Amports and Valero to implement operational improvements, including robust site cleaning and maintenance and investing in new equipment to reduce spills and tamp down dust. Choksi-Chugh anticipates cooperation on the part of the companies over the next three years.
"By the end of our negotiations, they were pretty cooperative," she said. "They knew they had a problem; they knew that they needed to fix it, and they were willing to work with us and our experts to identify what needed to be solved."
Neither Valero nor Amports responded to requests for comment.
The settlement marks the 300th win for Baykeeper in its 35 years of holding polluters and government agencies accountable in the Bay Area, Choksi-Chugh shared. Yet, it's other nonprofits that win the environmental mitigation funds.
The settlement money from Amports and Valero will go to local organizations working to benefit the health of the San Francisco Bay-Delta watershed, with the Rose Foundation managing the grant funds. Baykeeper itself is predominantly funded by individual donors (60%), followed by foundations (24%), corporations (13%) and in-kind donations (3%).
Once the funds from the settlement come in, Jodene Isaacs, director of grantmaking at the Rose Foundation, explained that grants will be awarded to nonprofit groups with projects that focus on water quality improvement. She described the types of organizations or projects that should apply once the application is available.
"Because we're in the Bay Area, there are a lot of environmental community groups, especially environmental justice groups, that we hope will apply," Isaacs explained. "We love restoration. We love youth education that has a component of teaching workforce skills -- training kids to go into environmental careers. Even things like collecting trash and cleanups for people to get involved in their communities around the bay or in watersheds. Those are all fair game."
Isaacs called the settlement a big win for the community.
"We're thrilled to partner with Baykeeper in getting money out to the community and focusing on contributing to real improvements in water quality," Isaacs said.
Choksi-Chugh, who joined Baykeeper straight out of law school in 2002, hopes the settlement sends a message to polluters around the Bay.
"It's really important to hold companies like this accountable," said Choksi-Chugh. "If they're going to operate here, they need to be better stewards of our communities and our environment. And they should know that Baykeeper is on the watch."
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