The Marathon Martinez Renewable Fuels Facility is located in the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...

in an unincorporated area known as Avon, East of

Martinez, California Martinez (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Martínez'') is a city in and the county seat of Contra Costa County, California, United States, in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Located on the southern shore of the Carquinez Strai ...

. It refines biobased feedstocks such as

animal fat Animal fats are lipids derived from animals which are used by the animal for a multitude of functions, or can be used by humans for dietary, sanitary, and cosmetic purposes. Depending on the temperature of the fat, it can change between a solid s ...

soybean oil Soybean oil (British English: soyabean oil) is a vegetable oil extracted from soybean (''Glycine max'') legumes. It is one of the most widely consumed cooking oils and the second most consumed vegetable oil. As a drying oil, processed soybean oil ...

and

corn oil Corn oil (North American) or maize oil (British) is oil extracted from the germ of corn (maize). Its main use is in cooking, where its high smoke point makes refined corn oil a valuable frying oil. It is also a key ingredient in some margarin ...

into renewable diesel. Previously owned by

Tidewater Petroleum Tidewater Oil Company (rendered as Tide Water Oil Company from 1887 to 1936) was a major petroleum refining company during the early 20th century. After operating independently from 1887 to 1926, Tidewater was sold to a holding company. Over the ...

, Tosco,

Valero Energy Valero Energy Corporation is an American-based fuels producer mostly involved in manufacturing and marketing transportation fuels and other related products. It is headquartered in San Antonio, Texas, United States. Throughout the United Sta ...

, Tesoro and

Marathon Petroleum Marathon Petroleum Corporation is an petroleum industry in the United States, American petroleum refining, marketing, and transportation company headquartered in Findlay, Ohio. The company was a wholly owned subsidiary of Marathon Oil until a cor ...

. The refinery is located on 850 acres, in 2016 had approximately 650 full-time employees, and had a crude oil capacity of 157,000 barrels per day. In 2015 it was the fourth-largest refinery in the state. The refinery had a Nelson complexity index of 16.1.

History

Established in 1878–1879, Avon was railroad station named for Shakespeare's Avon. It was originally called Marsh, and in 1913 the name was changed to Associated. The name Marsh was in honor of John Marsh. The name Associated was for the Tidewater Associated Oil Company, owner of the site. The refinery was first built in 1913 under the name Avon Refinery, and has been continually expanded since. It was purchased by Tosco in 1976. By the 1990s, a history of poor maintenance and under-staffing gave the refinery a reputation for being a hazardous workplace. Throughout the 1990s, it led the US refining industry in the number of environmental and safety code violations. These poor conditions culminated in two catastrophic accidents. In the first, a 1997

hydrocracker In petrochemistry, petroleum geology and organic chemistry, cracking is the process whereby complex organic molecules such as kerogens or long-chain hydrocarbons are broken down into simpler molecules such as light hydrocarbons, by the breaking ...

explosion killed one worker. In the second of these, four workers died and a fifth was hospitalized in a 1999

naphtha Naphtha (, recorded as less common or nonstandard in all dictionaries: ) is a flammable liquid hydrocarbon mixture. Generally, it is a fraction of crude oil, but it can also be produced from natural-gas condensates, petroleum distillates, and ...

explosion. A maintenance supervisor refused to shut down the unit after corroding valves failed to stop the flow of the extremely hazardous substance. In May 2002, the refinery was purchased by Tesoro Petroleum from

, along with 70 Ultramar and Beacon gas stations in Northern California, for the total of $1.075 billion. In November 2010, the refinery had a flaring event, due to a simultaneous

PG&E The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is an American investor-owned utility (IOU). The company is headquartered at Kaiser Center, in Oakland, California. PG&E provides natural gas and electricity to 5.2 million households in the norther ...

utility power and

Foster Wheeler Foster Wheeler AG (formerly Foster Wheeler Inc.) was a Swiss global engineering conglomerate with its principal executive offices in Reading, UK and its registered office in Baar, Canton of Zug, Switzerland. Foster Wheeler was added to the NASD ...

co-generation plant failure, that produced large quantities of thick black smoke. In February 2015, a nationwide strike by USW represented employees resulted in the closure of the Martinez refinery, the only refinery closure resulting from the strike. On December 15, 2015, thick smoke and flames could be seen rising up from the refinery. Due to the loss of a primary steam generation unit, flaring was done to release pressure. A level-2 alert was issued to the community, recommending that they stay indoors due to smoke blowing offsite. The alert was reduced to Level 0 on the same day. Due to the

COVID-19 Pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, the

refinery A refinery is a production facility composed of a group of chemical engineering unit processes and unit operations refining certain materials or converting raw material into products of value. Types of refineries Different types of refineries ...

went into idle mode in early 2020 and stopped all production. After nearly half a year, the company decided to shut down production and laid off over 720 employees with the majority of them leaving work on October 28, 2020. Some employees remained as the refinery became a tank and storage facility. In early 2021, the refinery was given to green light to start converting its units so it could produce renewable diesel made from animal tallow, corn oil, and soybean oil. They partnered with

Neste Neste Oyj (international name: Neste Corporation; former names Neste Oil Corporation and Fortum Oil and Gas Oy; ) is an oil refining and marketing company located in Espoo, Finland. It produces, refines and markets oil products, provides eng ...

in a 50/50 join venture and began producing renewable diesel in late 2022 and moving up to full capacity in 2023 making it one of the largest renewable diesel refineries in the world.

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://www.pbfenergy.com/refineries/ Oil refineries in the United States Oil refineries in California Martinez, California Buildings and structures in Contra Costa County, California Energy infrastructure in California Petroleum in California Energy in the San Francisco Bay Area 1913 establishments in California Energy infrastructure completed in 1913