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SupportTheDeepening - Rep. John Perzel: Delaware River Channel Must Be Deepened to Improve Oil Refinery Production and Regional Economy
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Rep. John Perzel: Delaware River Channel Must Be Deepened to Improve Oil Refinery Production and Regional Economy |
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January 31st, 2006 10:24am |
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By John Perzel, Speaker of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives,
State Representative for the 172nd Legislative District and member of the Delaware River Port Authority Board of Commissioners
Directly or indirectly, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have made us all aware of the social and economic realities that a loss of refinery production can have on our everyday lives. Higher fuel costs have contributed to price increases in everything from airline tickets to utility bills to gasoline to home heating oil. Given the realities confronting Americans in the aftermath of the Gulf-coast hurricanes, it is vital to our economic future that we begin to look for ways to make our current refinery production as efficient as possible and find solutions to increase production so we are not faced with similar crises in the future. Simply put, American companies do not need another increase in the cost of doing business in an unforgiving global economy.
I believe that some of these solutions can be found right here in the Delaware Valley. We are home to the second largest petro-chemical refining center in the country, and there are six major petroleum refineries along the Delaware River: three in Pennsylvania, two in New Jersey and one in Delaware. These refineries, which have a combined refining production of more than 1 million barrels per day, depend on the main shipping channel of the Delaware River to deliver crude oil.
For nearly 20 years there has been a proposal to deepen the main shipping channel of the Delaware River to enable modern ships to more efficiently deliver crude oil to these refineries. The channel deepening project would increase the overall efficiency of the existing refining process. It would be a major step toward improving the economic viability of the port complex and, in turn, the entire region.
Unfortunately, this innovative economic development project has been stalled. Recently, an official was quoted by this paper as questioning the economic feasibility of the project, even with the evidence of higher energy costs.
Clearly, recent natural disasters have proven the economic need for improving refinery production in our region. The port complex in the tri-state region is the fifth largest port complex in the country, bringing in an estimated 70 million tons of cargo from 3,000 ships each year. Oil accounts for 30 percent of the ship cargoes coming into the complex with nearly 900 tank vessels per year.
While deepening the Delaware River is not a magical solution to the country’s refinery production challenges, I do believe it is a step in the right direction. If we do not improve the efficiency of current refinery production and consider solutions to add new production, then we will have learned nothing from the lessons of Katrina and Rita.
I urge the governors of Pennsylvania and New Jersey to make the Delaware River channel deepening project a reality - if not for us, for future generations. We simply must work to make our region’s refinery production more efficient and must address the challenges of not having enough refinery production to support the American people and businesses. |
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