OpenStreetMap (new tab)

Google Map (new tab)

Google Streetview (new tab)

The Atlantic Richfield Company of Los Angeles, CA, built this important refinery in 1970-1971, having at the beginning the capacity to produce 100,000 barrels of oil per day. Its location on a port enabled tankers carrying Alaskan crude oil to unload efficiently. By 2012, capacity had grown to 225,000 barrels per day, making it one of the top five facilities of its kind on the West Coast. It accounted for about 8.7% of the crude oil produced in CA, OR, and WA, and was a crucial producer of jet fuel for the nearby Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. The plant also produced anode-grade calcined coke--(made from oil residue from the refining process), used in aluminum production's electro-chemical, Hall-Heroult reduction process at the Alcoa Intalco Works in nearby Ferndale, WA. (See "Overview,"Accessed 08/15/2012.)

In 2012, BP's Cherry Point facility covered 740 acres of what was previously farmland, a property bounded by Grandview Road on the north, Point Whitehorn Road to the south, and Jackson Road due west. It employed about 800 people, making it one of Whatcom County's largest private employers. The plant had several units, including a coker unit (producing calcined petroleum coke) and the crude distillation unit.

A large fire erupted in the plant's crude distillation unit (CDU) on 02/17/2012. It was contained that day, idling crude oil production for a brief period. A Reuters news article stated on 02/18/2012: "The West Coast market is particularly sensitive to refinery glitches because it is largely isolated from the rest of the U.S. refinery system. The CDU is at the heart of the refining process, breaking down thick molecules into feedstock that other units turn into finished fuel for cars, trucks and airplanes. But BP could decide to bypass the CDU during repairs and run the other production units with feed stocks purchased on the market, Hackett [oil analyst David Hackett, President of Stillwater Associates, Irvine, CA] said. BP Cherry Point, which was built in 1971, was originally designed to run Alaska North Slope crude oil, but can now run a variety of crude, including heavy Canadian oil." (See "BP idles large Washington state refinery after fire,"Accessed 08/14/2012.)

PCAD id: 7074