Mt. Belvieu: Way Station

~"" 81 :5 eihVlene proPvlene Mt. Belvieu: Way station If you didn't already know the Mt. Belvieu station was there, chan ces are you'd not run across it. There are no bill boards directing you to it, no traffic light where you turn off the two· lane blacktop onto the one· lane road leading up to its build· m gs. It sits just outside a town - Mt. Belvieu, Texas - not much larger tha n some neighborhoods in H ous· ton, which lies about30 miles west. It was built on land about as nonde· script as it comes - flat, wide and virtually ignored by such things as trees or picturesque flora. But though it draws little outside attention to itself, the Mt. Blevieu facility stands out for Shell Pipe Line Corp. as one of the critical elements in the Texas·Louisiana ethylene system, as well as in the T exas ethylene and propylene system. Having gone on·line a little more than two years ago, the station boasts the latest in ethylene and propylene handling technology and equipment. Its computers and sen· sitive monitoring gear are enough to impress even those around elec· tronics on a regular basis, and the size of its dryers and compressors are enough to give an y visitor pause. It is a large facility and it handles a lot of volume - sometimes as much as 400,000 pounds an hour. But as impressive as Mt. Belvieu is to look at, as impressive as its clean , well· kept equipment is to see, it remains the job of people you might never see to keep it running. And those employees are a ll keenly aware of the importan ce of the work they do. Briefly stated, Mt. Belvieu is a storage and h andling site for eth y· len e produced at Deer Park and Norco, a nd for propylene manufac· tured at Deer Park. It sits near four underground caverns in which prod· Maintenance at Mt. Be lvieu is an essential, on-going piece of business. uct is stored before delivery via for ethylene and propylene Communications t.echnician Johnny Hewitt (left) and e lectricial technician Marion Haynes Product storage attendant Ray Johnson says that often work together in keeping Mt. Belvieu's computer running ut top form. working with ethylene keeps him on his toes. pipeline to customers in Texas and of jobs both within and outside of aids my work here," he says, is that Louisiana (the propylene remains Shell, they represent a group whose 1 helped put this plant in. 1 was no in Texas). Both highly volatile, pro· different brands of know-how com stranger to it when we started oper pylene and ethylene must be main· bine to produce an effective work ation. And several of the employees tained at standard temperatures unit. here now, including two of the oper and pressures. Further, both must "There's a certain amount of ur ators, have also been here since the be kept as pure as possible. Since gency involved in working here," beginning." brine is used to fo rce them from the says Bob Higgins, operations fore On e of those operators is Ray caverns for delivery, they must be man. "The product h andled is rela Johnson, who came on from Good dried and cleansed of foreign mat tively more volatile than crude, but rich about 14 months ago. "1 worked ter. Ethylene requires the rather we know wh at we're into and what with crude at Goodrich ," says Ray, demanding purity of 99.9 percent. we're doing. We keep a pretty close "and what that means for me now Achieving that is no minor accom eye on everything," is that 1 have to really stay on my plishmentin itself, but coupled with Higgins learned to "keep an eye" toes. The plant is largely auto the volume the facility must some on things through his various as mated, of course, but there's still a times handle, it becomes a for signments in Pipe Line. As a staff lot of things 1 have to check, and midable task. gauger, terminal agent and opera even more I h ave to learn. It's men This is where the experience of tions foreman, he h as acquired a tally demanding, but once you get the Mt. Belvieu employees comes broad, working knowledge of pro the h ang of it, it makes you feel into play. Hailing from a wide range ducts handling. "But what really good to sit back and realize that But it's not all electronics. There's also the merchandise Gene Harper has to take care of: the machinery, the heavy equipment. During his 31 years with Shell Pipe, the vete· ran mechanical technician has plied his trade from one end of Texas to the other. Gene concedes that the ethylene/propylene equip· ment he's working with now is a change from the crude oil equip· ment he's worked with in the past, but maintains that "it's still nuts and bolts and iron." He's also quick to point out that the change from crude to chemical equipment keeps things "interesting." Which is also how Gregg Lyall finds it. A meter measurement tech· nician, Gregg says he's been inter· ested in working more with chemi· cals for some time. "I was a techni· cian in the Central Gulf Gathering System and decided I wanted to learn another phase of the busi· ness." Gregg got his initial electronics experience in the Air Force. He broadened that experience with sev· eral civilian firms and now takes care of such work as rebuilding meters and trouble·shooting ailing equipment. Other personnel at Mt. Belvieu Bob Higgins, operations foreman, has on-site responsibility for Mt. Belvieu, a facility some times called upon to handle as much as 400,000 pounds of product an hour. include product storage attendants John Calandra, Warren Chumley, you know something important." operated. A lot of what went in at Jay Gantenbein and Eddie How· Electrical technician Marion Mt. Belvieu was new to Pipe Line, ard, as well as utility pipeliner Haynes has his hands full, too. and bringing it on·line was a for· Gary Hallam. Experienced in ethylene plant oper· midable challenge. "Mt. Belvieu is a very important ation before he came to work for One ofthe major pieces of equip· facility for Shell Pipe Line," says Shell, it is Marion's job to, as he ment that had to be brought on·line John Anderson, western district puts it, "take care of anything with was the computer, used for every· manager for the Gulf Coast Div· a wire on it." thing from monitoring machinery ision, "if for no other reason than And that's a lot of wires. "We to setting up deliveries. It stays it's part of the first chemical sys· have some very sophisticated, very under the watchful eye of commun· tem Pipe Line has been completely sensitive equipment out there," he ications technician Johnny Hewitt, responsible for. People who visit says. "The process control instru· who received much of his pre· Shell Mt. Belvieu are usually impressed ments, the microprocessors, the gas training in the military. by its size (it covers about 25 acres, analyzers - they all do things they Beyond the computer, Johnny is not counting the storage caverns). shouldn't do from time to time. It's also responsible for keeping Mt. And they should be impressed; it's my job to figure out why they do it. Belvieu's phone system operating. an interesting facility. It took us 18 months to work out all "Most people probably don't r eal· "But more than the physical the bugs after we opened up here, ize this," he says, "but we don't plant, more than its size, it's the but on a plant this size, that's not have local telephone service in here. employees that make up the back· unusual. It's all Shell microwave, and it has bone of Mt. Belvieu, just like the It's also not too bad when you to work right all the time. Right employees at any Pipe Line loca consider that this is one of the first now, we've got four lines estab· tion, no matter where. chemical systems Pipe Line has lished, and they've yet to fail us. "They make it work." ... Go Devil Readership survey Most of you approve of the Go Devil, but there are some ideas for making it better. Get ready for a few numbers. No, answered to give a pretty good pic new hires, retirements and service get ready for quite a few numbers. t ure ofthe way the Go Devil's read a nniversaries. Readers who gave But don't despair; you should find ers feel about th e job it is doing for specific advice on improving the them interesting. them. Go Devil seemed to want more Not long ago, t he Editorial and Of those who responded to the about themselves and co-workers, Graphics Dept. of Shell Oil Co. - questionnaire, a full 81 percent said both on and off the job. Comments the department out of which the Go t hey read every issue of the Go in this vein included: "more arti Devil is produced - commissioned Devil; and 55 percent said th ey cles about the employees; write a con sulting firm to survey many would rather read it than Shell regularly about employees at each of the readers of Shell's employee News.

Load more