PORT NECHES, Texas – Authorities in Port Neches held more news conferences Thursday after rising levels of a chemical in the air Wednesday prompted officials to order a shelter-in-place and then a voluntary evacuation of the coastal town.
However, statements made by officials didn’t answer the questions that KPRC 2 Investigates has been asking for several days -- just how closely are officials tracking butadiene levels?
Butadiene is a cancer-causing chemical that officials said was burning eight days ago after a series of explosions at the TPC plant in Port Neches. Officials said the fire was officially extinguished Tuesday. On Wednesday, elevated levels of the chemical in the air prompted a shelter-in-place order then a voluntary evacuation order was issued for the town.
How much butadiene is in the air?
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality established a website that allows people to monitor butadiene levels in the area. However, there are lots of blanks in the data for butadiene.
In a series of emails with KPRC 2 Investigates, a TCEQ spokesman said that “a blank cell in the spreadsheet means that a specific reading for that parameter was not taken at that location.”
“So, it appears a majority of the handheld testing hasn’t been for butadiene specifically?” KPRC 2 Investigates asked.
“Right. But butadiene is included in the sampling for VOCs,” the agency spokesman replied. VOCs means volatile organic compounds.
TPC has hired another company to conduct its own air sampling. Company officials said that testing showed butadiene levels of 12 parts per million on Wednesday night when the evacuation order was issued. Long term health effects begin at about 670 parts per million, officials said.
Why an evacuation?
So, why was an evacuation ordered if the levels were so low? Officials said it’s because everybody is different.
“There are people with different levels of susceptibility,” said Jefferson County Judge Jeff Branick. “For instance, I love peanuts. I can eat them all day long, but there are people that are deathly allergic to peanuts, and I think that’s why we made the determination last night to do the evacuation.”
The company that is conducting TPC’s air monitoring said they offer a live feed of their data to any city that asks for it. So, far Port Neches is the only town in the area that has asked to access the data. Neighboring Groves and Nederland have not.
Official information about the fire and the response is being posted at PortNechesResponse.com.