Texas Fishermen Sue Koch Over Oil Spill

Flint Hills Resources, a refining subsidiary of the industrial and petrochemical giant Koch (formerly Koch Industries), has been hit with a civil suit brought by commercial fishermen and shrimpers due to a December 2022 oil spill in the Nueces and Corpus Christi bays in Texas.

More than 2,300 commercial fishermen filed a federal class action lawsuit in December, claiming that Koch’s company initially misstated the size of the spill as being 90 barrels (or 3,800 gallons) of light crude, even though the Texas Coast Guard determined it was actually 335 barrels (or 14,000 gallons). As a result, the “initial deceit caused the urgently needed response to be significantly less than necessary to prevent the unfettered spread of the oil,” the plaintiffs note in their lawsuit.

The court has set a January 20 deadline for Flint Hills Resources to file its response.

In a third-party report released four months after the incident, Flint Hills admitted it failed to properly weatherize a pipeline that transferred waste from the refining process to a terminal tank. This led to the pipeline fracturing and releasing oil farther down the line. The report commissioned by Flint Hills and submitted to the city of Corpus Christi and state agencies emphasizes the efforts the company made to contain the leak but barely mentions the remediation needed to restore the shoreline.

Even though Flint Hills employed 300 people in clean-up efforts and used boats and planes to determine the parameters of the oil slick, the plaintiffs allege that the spill “has had detrimental effects” on the bay and the Gulf of Mexico, along with the “activities” they rely on — “fishing, shrimping and oystering” — “to earn their livelihood.”

The plaintiffs also point out that the incident compelled the state of Texas to restrict fishing in areas affected by the spill. Although they do not call for a specific amount in damages, they ask to be compensated not just for loss of income but that a jury assess punitive damages against Flint Hills for acting “willfully and wantonly” in failing to maintain its pipeline properly.

The lawsuit alleges that the company’s “acts and omissions with respect to the release of crude oil and other toxic substances have caused and continue to cause a material, substantial and unreasonable interference with Plaintiffs’ use and enjoyment of their property and business and has materially diminished” the value of both. 

After the U.S. Department of Justice sued Flint Hills, the company did not admit any wrongdoing but agreed through a consent decree to pay almost $1 million to the Coast Guard and the state for clean-up and restoration projects. 

In their class action suit, fishermen claim that damages to their business continue despite insistence from Flint Hills that the clean up was a success. No attempt has been made by the government or the company to compensate anyone for loss of income.

Although the spill wasn’t large, the Congressional Research Service, a legislative branch agency of the Library of Congress, notes: “The impacts of an oil spill depend on the size of the spill, the rate of the spill, the type of oil spilled, and the location of the spill. Depending on timing and location, even a relatively minor spill can cause significant harm to individual organisms and entire populations.”

Koch’s pipelines have long been known for their problems. The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) has previously reported on another instance where Koch misled government regulators about work at one of its pipelines. 

In September 2023, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) fined Georgia-Pacific, a subsidiary of Koch, $1.2 million for abandoning a natural gas pipeline without notifying federal regulators and lying about work already completed once it did notify them.

In addition, Koch has not just polluted the Gulf around Corpus Christi. In 2000 a federal grand jury indicted Koch Industries and Koch Petroleum Group for toxic air emissions at a Texas refinery in violation of the Clean Air Act. Senior corporate employees were named in the indictment for making false and misleading statements to the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, insisting that the plant was in compliance with clean air regulations.

As Greenpeace reports, “Initially facing a 97-count indictment and potential fines of $350 million, Koch cut a deal [in 2001] with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft to drop all major charges in exchange for a guilty plea for falsifying documents, and a $20-million settlement.” 

Prior to becoming attorney general, Ashcroft had been a Republican U.S. senator from Missouri. When up for reelection in 2000, he received $10,000, the maximum allowed at that time, from Koch’s political action committee.

In another consent decree in 2000, Koch paid the federal government a record $30-million civil penalty and spent $5 million on environmental projects for spilling 3 million gallons of crude oil and related products into 300 ponds, bays, rivers, and on shorelines in six states between 1990 and 1998. 

According to its Violation Tracker database, the nonpartisan organization Good Jobs First reports that since 2000 Koch has violated state and federal environmental regulations 251 times. In total, the company paid almost $816 million in fines, on clean-up and restoration costs, and for technological improvements to its facilities to reduce future harm to the environment, workers, and impacted residents.