TO “crude oil leak” at the TotalEnergies refinery in Donges pollutes “an area of 500 square meters” of the Loire, announced the prefecture of Loire-Atlantique, on Sunday morning, November 24, through a press release. It says to contain “in part” pollution by “a double containment system using floating barriers, despite the weather conditions that make it difficult to surround this iridescent area”.
It was Saturday afternoon when “The TotalEnergies refinery in Donges detected a crude oil leak in an elbow of a 30 centimeter diameter pipe”informs the prefecture. “The leak materialized as a 2-centimeter break in a weld bead”that created “a trickle of water has caused an iridescence of an area of approximately 500 square meters in the Loire.”
The incident was detected at 10:50 p.m. on Saturday, TotalEnergies said in a Sunday news release. “The flow of crude oil in the Loire” He was arrested at night, “from 1:40 am”AND “the device was completed this [dimanche] tomorrow at 8:50 amthe company added. According to the prefecture, it is “From 3:45 am” Sunday that “There will be no more flow of crude oil into the Loire.” She adds that “interventions” were launched “to permanently seal the leak” and he said he moved “all state services (…) immediately “.
Total shutdown in February due to corrosion
“The amount of product escaped [dans la] The Loire has less than 15 cubic meters »according to TotalEnergies. Analysis carried out on the banks of the Loire “did not reveal traces of hydrocarbons” AND “There are no anomalies in the air either” was not registered, the company stated. “The iridescent waters should partly disperse naturally and be transported, by the action of the wind, to the shores”had previously communicated to the prefecture, ensuring that it was continuing to evaluate the environmental impact of this leak.
In December 2022, a leak from this refinery, classified Seveso as high threshold, caused the flow of 700,000 liters of gasoline. By the end of February 2024, the refinery had been completely closed.” to make necessary repairs following corrosion in one unit and blockage in a second”argued the management of the refinery.
The Donges platform, which occupies an area of almost 350 hectares and employs 650 employees, is the group’s second refinery in France, after the one in Normandy, in Gonfreville-l’Orcher (Seine-Maritime), according to the website of Total Energies. The Donges site has a processing capacity of 11 million tons of crude oil per year, for a storage capacity of 2.2 million cubic meters (crude oil and finished products), according to the same source.
