Like many other small towns along the western Gulf Coast in Texas and my native Louisiana that are dominated by the petrochemical industry, folks in Port Neches, Texas, used to breathe in the occasional noxious odors from its biggest employer — a giant, aging facility belonging to the TPC Group — and considered it the smell of money. At first, residents’ faith in the petrochemical...
At TPC Group’s massive, aging petrochemical plant in Port Neches. Texas, near the Gulf Coast, tit was not supposed to be like this. In 2017, the company reached a deal with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to aggressively monitor the air surrounding the facility for 1,3 butadiene — a highly flammable, carcinogenic chemical that had been leaking from the site — and to take...
Thanksgiving was cancelled in Port Neches, Texas, this year. Things ever should have gotten to this point. Very early on the days before the holiday, this Gulf Coast community near the Texas-Louisiana border was rocked by one explosion that lit the night sky — then another, hours later. Residents of Port Neches and several surrounding communities, where windows were shattered by the force...
