ILTA Testifies to Senate Committee on COVID-19 Impacts on Terminals

ILTA submitted written testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, which held a hearing June 16 to examine the impacts of COVID-19 on the energy industry. ILTA told the committee that the liquid terminal industry, and particularly terminal storage, saw enormous impacts from the pandemic, and it went above and beyond to successfully manage these challenges. Regulators should recognize physical constraints on industry, ILTA added.

Specifically, the comments discussed the challenges of conducting required out-of-service inspections when storage is near or completely full. “The Environmental Protection Agency seems to acknowledge the difficulty faced by terminal operators, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, but its guidance to date has been sparse and has not provided adequate certainty for terminal operators,” ILTA wrote. “[W]hen oil and refined product markets come closer into balance…there will almost certainly be a substantial backlog of tanks requiring these decadal inspections. Depending on how EPA approaches this problem, it could cause additional hardships for the industry.”

ILTA also issued a press release, highlighting key excerpts from the testimony.