Accidents Waiting to Happen: Industrial Toxic Chemicals

Across the United States, thousands of facilities use or store toxic chemicals ranging from lead compounds to organic solvents such as benzene and toluene. Many of these facilities are located near waterways. Industrial spills of toxic chemicals can pollute waterways and put our health and environment at risk. 

Industrial facilities store millions of tons of hazardous chemicals 

Industrial facilities – many of them located near waterways – store millions of tons of hazardous chemicals on-site. In 2022, industrial facilities reporting to the federal Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) managed 28.6 billion pounds of toxic waste. A much higher volume of toxic chemicals is likely stored at facilities or used in manufacturing. In Massachusetts, for example, where the state’s 1989 Toxics Use Reduction Act provides a unique window into how toxic chemicals are used and stored (and has driven a 46% decline in toxic chemical use at covered facilities between 1990 and 2021), covered facilities used nine times the volume of toxic chemicals that they generated as waste. If the same ratio were to hold true nationally, more than 261 billion pounds of toxic chemicals would have been used at industrial facilities reporting to TRI nationwide in 2022.

Toxic chemical spills are common

Industrial spills have a wide range of causes, from equipment failure to human error to extreme weather events. When industrial facilities that store toxic chemicals are located at the water’s edge — as many are for cooling, access to water transportation, or to make waste discharges — spills can severely damage America’s rivers, lakes and streams. 

A 2022 Government Accountability Office (GAO) study found that there were an average of 190 “accidental chemical releases” to air, water or land per year – about one every other day – across a set of over 11,000 facilities that store large volumes of toxic chemicals between 2010-2019.

Recent industrial toxic chemical spills have damaged waterways or put them at risk:

• In March 2023, a chemical plant in Bucks County, Pa. spilled 8,100 gallons of toxic latex finishing chemicals into Otter Creek, which flows into the Delaware River about 20 miles northeast of Philadelphia. Philadelphia temporarily shut down its Delaware River water intake to prevent contamination of drinking water.  

• In December 2022, a 500-gallon spill of copper carbonate, a wood-preserving chemical, killed fish along a 1.4-mile stretch of the Brunswick Canal in Glynn County, Ga. 

• In July 2017, an herbicide and pesticide additive spilled from a storage facility into a creek in Roanoke, Va., killing tens of thousands of fish.

• In January 2014, a tank leak at the Freedom Industries plant in Charleston, W.Va. spilled approximately 11,000 gallons of chemicals, including the toxic chemical MCHM, into the Elk River. The pollution sickened residents and interrupted the water supply for 300,000 people.

Flood-prone facilities pose elevated risks to waterways

Facilities that store toxic chemicals pose special dangers when they are located in areas that are susceptible to flooding or are vulnerable to storm surge inundation during tropical storms.

More than 2,000 facilities storing large volumes of toxic chemicals are located in “high flood hazard” areas, according to the GAO.

Out of 11,000 total facilities analyzed by the GAO, more than 700 were in areas that could be impacted by a Category 4 or 5 hurricane storm surge.

More than 180 facilities in the Houston metropolitan area that make, use or store toxic chemicals are potentially vulnerable to storm surge from a Category 4 or 5 hurricane. Data: U.S. Government Accountability OfficePhoto by staff | TPIN

Spotlight: Houston-area toxic chemical facilities in storm-surge zones

The Houston area is the center of America’s petrochemical industry, which has severely damaged the region’s waterways. Contamination with toxic dioxin and PCBs has rendered fish in many area waterways unsafe to eat. The location of petrochemical facilities on low-lying land vulnerable to tropical storm surge flooding creates the risk of additional toxic contamination to waterways as well as health impacts to people living in or near the flood zone. 

Hurricane Harvey, which hit the Houston area in 2017, illustrated the dangers of locating facilities with highly toxic chemicals next to waterways. Over 100 toxic chemical releases to water, air and land occurred in and around Houston because of Hurricane Harvey, including: 

• 34,000 pounds of lye and 300 pounds of benzene leaked into hurricane-caused floodwaters from the Chevron Phillips chemical plant adjacent to Cedar Bayou in Baytown, Texas. 
• An additional 3,000 pounds of benzene spilled from Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s complex in Deer Park, which is located along Buffalo Bayou. 
• 80,000 gallons of methanol spilled from a ruptured tank at Channel Biorefinery & Terminals into Greens Bayou. 100,000 gallons of glycerine also spilled from the same facility into nearby floodwaters.

Data from the GAO indicates that 188 facilities in the Houston area remain in storm surge zones for similarly powerful (Category 4 and 5) hurricanes.

Other areas with a large number of toxic facilities in major hurricane (Category 4/5) storm surge zones include Louisiana, Florida and New Jersey.

Protect America’s waterways from toxic spills 

Industrial facilities that store or use toxic chemicals put America’s streams and rivers at risk, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Policymakers should take the following steps to protect our waterways from this pollution threat: 

• Reduce the use of toxic chemicals: The industrial use of hazardous substances is the root cause of these accidents waiting to happen. We should phase out the use of highly toxic chemicals, especially when safer alternatives already exist.

• Keep toxic facilities away from our waterways and flood zones: Locating high volumes of toxic substances in flood zones or near our rivers creates additional unnecessary risks for drinking water sources and human health.

• Set and enforce strict water quality and chemical safety standards for existing toxic facilities that operate near waterways. Strict standards should apply to any facilities that store or transport hazardous material near water.

• Ensure that all waterways – including wetlands and streams – are protected from toxic spills and other pollution.

To find out more

• To see where facilities are storing hazardous chemicals in your area, consult the Government Accountability Office’s online interactive tool. The tool also marks which facilities may be affected by a variety of natural hazards, including floods and storm surges. 
• The Environmental Protection Agency’s 2022 Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) National Analysis provides information on toxic releases by location, industry and method. Its TRI explorer tool has toxic release data dating back to 2003 that can be customized by location, industry, method and chemical type. Massachusetts provides statewide data on toxic chemical use, as well as disposal.
• For more information on toxic chemicals and the health risks they pose, see the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Toxic Substances Portal.
• For more information on accidental chemical releases, see the Coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters’ sortable database of incidents across the country since January 2021, which includes an interactive map and is updated weekly.