While the Center for Progressive Reform staff advocate for stronger protections from toxic chemical spills, none of our experts assumed that one of our own would gain firsthand experience on the matter.
That all changed last January, when Board Member and Scholar Sid Shapiro received a surprise midnight phone call warning him that a nearby fertilizer plant in Winston-Salem, N.C., had just caught fire. Inside the plant and stored in a tank outside were 500 tons of highly explosive ammonium nitrate, threatening to incinerate nearby communities.
In the In Our Backyard Podcast, hosted by the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, Shapiro, David Flores, a former senior policy analyst at the Center, and Senior Policy Analyst Darya Minovi shared their perspectives on the Winston-Salem incident and what it means for communities at risk of chemical spills, which are disproportionately low-wealth communities of color. They explored the health safety risks involved and the role of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations in preventing disasters like this in the future.
Flores kicked off the series in episode five by describing the causes of the event. The plant had not met modern fire code regulations — having been grandfathered into the newest code and bypassing it — so when a small fire broke out, it quickly grew.
Given the lack of basic preventative measures, such as sprinklers and fire alarms, Flores was astounded that the fire burned itself out and didn’t ignite the 400 tons of ammonium nitrate chemical stored inside the plant and the extra 100 tons in a railcar outside. Had it been compacted and heated, as could happen when a building collapses during a fire, the ammonium nitrate could have exploded, leveling buildings and killing anyone nearby.
Ammonium nitrate, Flores added, is not yet regulated by the EPA’s Risk Management Rule as a hazardous chemical, even though it has caused devastating explosions before. The last incident was in 2013, in West, Texas, at another fertilizer plant, which killed 15, injured more than 260, and destroyed more than 150 buildings.
Safer alternatives are readily available for fertilizer production, which begs the question: Why hasn’t the EPA taken action to regulate similar hazardous chemical plants across the United States? Surrounding communities are directly impacted when disaster strikes and are at increasing risk as our climate changes and as facilities fail to adapt or upgrade to handle new environmental conditions.
‘We were just lucky’
In episode seven, Shapiro described his experience with the Winston-Salem incident as a nearby resident. He, along with about 6,500 other people who live within a one-mile radius of the plant, were urged to evacuate when the fire broke out near midnight to protect themselves from the equivalent of “a chemical bomb capable of wiping out blocks of the city.” The city lacked the resources to enforce a mandatory evacuation, he said, and the fire was too dangerous to attempt to extinguish, so the only action was to wait for the fire to burn out and hope that an explosion wouldn’t occur.
The EPA’s responsibility with regard to chemical disasters is to, first, prevent them and, second, mitigate the impacts of those that do occur,, both of which were severely lacking in this incident.
Both the fire and potential explosion were preventable through proper regulation and safety measures. Shapiro pointed out that such industrial areas are often surrounded by low-wealth communities of color who are driven to the area due to a lack of affordable housing in safer neighborhoods. Already under-resourced and disenfranchised, these communities face the greatest risk of harm from inadequate industry regulations. “We were just lucky,” Shapiro said. The potential explosion could have been catastrophic.
Public health and safety
Minovi rounded out the series in the season’s eighth episode with a perspective on public health and safety, explaining that the area around the fertilizer plant already had prior air pollution burdens from several other sources, all of which were exacerbated by the fire.
The hazardous chemicals released into the air and recorded by EPA monitoring after the fire were particularly concerning for individuals with respiratory issues. From simple lung irritation to exacerbated asthma, the range of potential adverse health effects is wide.
Minovi highlighted Winston-Salem’s initiative to provide financial resources to those affected by the fire, which she called a great start, but she pointed out that environmental injustice must be addressed beyond direct financial support.
In each episode, the unifying theme was that the EPA must uphold its responsibility to regulate hazardous chemical facilities across the United States.
Aboveground tanks, such as the parked railcar at the Winston-Salem plant, are regularly left unchecked and unmonitored, threatening communities and the environment with spills and explosions.
The Center for Progressive Reform is committed to advocating for the regulation of hazardous materials, and we are currently recommending programs and reforms in Virginia and nationwide to prevent disasters and protect those at risk.
You can listen to the In Our Backyard Podcast series—including Episodes 5-8 featuring David Flores, Darya Minovi, and Sid Shapiro— online here or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Alex Kupyna | May 23, 2022
While the Center for Progressive Reform staff advocate for stronger protections from toxic chemical spills, none of our experts assumed that one of our own would gain firsthand experience on the matter.
Jake Moore | May 19, 2022
In 2001, an explosion at the Motiva Enterprises Delaware City Refinery caused a 1 million gallon sulfuric acid spill, killing one worker and severely injuring eight others. In 2008, an aboveground storage tank containing 2 million gallons of liquid fertilizer collapsed at the Allied Terminals facility in Chesapeake, Virginia, critically injuring two workers exposed to hazardous vapors. In 2021, the release of over 100,000 gallons of chemicals at a Texas plant killed two contractors and hospitalized 30 others. In addition to injury and death, workplace chemical spills and exposures contribute to an estimated 50,000 work-related diseases such as asthma and chronic lung disease each year, as well as nearly 200,000 hospitalizations. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was created to reduce risks and hazards to workers, and to prevent incidents like these. However, following through on this promise has been another matter.
Daniel Farber | May 4, 2022
Soon after Trump took office, Republicans used the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to overturn sixteen Obama-era regulations. If they win control of the government in 2024, they'll undoubtedly do the same thing to Biden regulations. It behooves us, then, to understand the effect of these legislative interventions. A Ninth Circuit ruling last week in a case involving bear baiting, Safari Club v. Haaland sheds new light on this murky subject.
Daniel Farber | May 2, 2022
Court watchers and environmentalists are waiting with bated breath for the U.S. Supreme Court to rule on West Virginia v. EPA, the Court's most important climate change case in a generation. The issue in that case is what, if anything, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can do to regulate carbon emissions from power plants and factories. Last week, conservative states asked the Court to intervene in another climate change case. How the Court responds could give us hints into just how far the activist conservative majority is likely to go in the West Virginia case.
James Goodwin | April 27, 2022
Few policy questions have a more profound impact on our day-to-lives than how we produce, transport, and use energy. Whether it's a fight against the siting of a polluting natural gas facility in a historically Black community, the catastrophic failure of an electric grid following a winter storm, foreign wars causing price shocks that further hollow out the fixed incomes of America's older adults, or an abiding concern over leaving our grandchildren a habitable climate — all these issues and more make energy policy a central concern for the public. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) — which oversees much of the country's energy infrastructure and helps set rules, rates, and standards for energy markets — is undertaking new efforts to level the playing field. A new Center for Progressive Reform report examines one of these efforts: the establishment of the Office of Public Participation (OPP). After decades of delay, FERC finally began setting up the office this past year.
Marcha Chaudry | April 26, 2022
Earlier this month, HBO Max aired an important series about toxic ingredients in cosmetic products. The series also examined the professional beauty industry and the health effects to workers exposed to toxic ingredients. Toxic ingredients are found in cosmetics and other personal care products. The toxic chemicals used in them have been linked to a wide range of health problems, including ovarian cancer, breast cancer, early-onset puberty, fibroids and endometriosis, miscarriage, poor maternal and infant health outcomes, diabetes and obesity, and more. As I noted in Not So Pretty, "There is a loophole in federal regulation that allows industry to use almost any ingredient and label it as 'fragrance.'"
Daniel Farber | April 25, 2022
Last week, the White House undid an effort by the Trump administration to undermine the use of environmental impact statements. The prior rules had been in effect since 1978. Restoring the 1978 version was the right thing to do. The Trump rules arbitrarily limited the scope of the environmental effects that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can consider under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Their goal was clearly to prevent consideration of climate change.
Jake Moore | April 22, 2022
In October 2022, the Clean Water Act will turn 50. Though heralded as a crowning environmental achievement, some argue it's a costly and ineffective law. Half a century later, what has it achieved, and what can policymakers improve?
Minor Sinclair | April 21, 2022
I'm hopeful the recent disco revival won't last but that other resurging movements of the 1960s and '70s will. That era saw the birth and explosive growth of the modern environmental movement alongside other sweeping actions for peace and equality. Public pressure led to critical environmental laws that continue to protect our natural resources and our health and safety. In 1970, Congress created the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and enacted the Clean Air Act, which authorizes the federal government to limit air pollution, and the Occupational Safety and Health Act, which established the first nationwide program to protect workers from on-the-job harm. Two years later came passage of the Clean Water Act, a landmark amendment to existing anti-pollution law that requires our government to restore and maintain clean and healthy waterways across the land. That was some era -- the last great upsurge of government protections.