August 18, 2012:

A power outage shut down the Sinclair Oil refinery near Rawlins on Thursday. The 4:30 p.m. outage forced the company to engage emergency shutdown procedures, which included sounding an emergency whistle and heavily burning gas through the refinery’s flare stack, according to Sinclair Police Chief Jeff Sanders. Power has since been restored to the plant, according to a company statement released Friday. No workers were injured in the outage, which forced the company to idle the refinery overnight. The police department closed roads surrounding the refinery for about an hour as the flares burned. Sanders said the closure was precautionary because of wind direction. “It’s the normal procedure in the event of a power outage,” he said. The company is evaluating equipment in the wake of the outage. At least one sulfur processing unit was damaged. Sinclair said in its statement that “inconsistent power” is a concern. Area refinery officials broached the power outage topic at a recent safety meeting convened by Sinclair.

The Sinclair refinery is powered by the Jim Bridger and Dave Johnson public power plants, both owned by Rocky Mountain Power. Rocky Mountain power has worked closely with Sinclair to increase reliability in the.  Rawlins area, according to Dave Eskelsen, a spokesman for the company. “We strive to provide highly reliable electric service, but can’t and do not guarantee uninterrupted service,” he said. Rocky Mountain Power is investigating the outage.

By trib.com