WHITING, Ind. (AP) — Power has been restored to BP’s sprawling oil refinery in northwest Indiana following an outage that prompted the company to temporarily close the complex and evacuate its workers, BP announced Friday.
BP spokeswoman Christina Audisho said in a statement that power returned to the refinery Friday after Thursday’s outage, and that the refinery’s office buildings and nearby roads had reopened.
She said “operations have been stabilized at the refinery.” But Audisho did not immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press asking BP to provide details on the situation at the refinery, including whether refining had resumed and whether the cause of the outage had been determined.
Audisho said all refinery personnel were accounted for and no injuries were reported following the outage at the refinery, located along Lake Michigan about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southeast of Chicago.
The city of Whiting said Thursday that the refinery was burning its stacks in response to the outage “to burn off additional product” in what was described as a “normal process” following such an event.
Audisho said in a Friday statement that air monitoring continued around the refinery “and no elevated values were recorded.”
The city of Whiting said air quality monitoring conducted at multiple locations by BP and Lake County determined “there is no danger to the public.”
The refinery is the largest in the U.S. Midwest and the sixth largest nationally, processing approximately 440,000 barrels of crude oil per day, producing a variety of liquid fuels and asphalt.
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