(Adds byline, dateline, protest coincides with presidential
debate, Exxon plant operations continue)
By Erwin Seba
HOUSTON, Sept 12 (Reuters) - The U.S. Coast Guard on
Thursday closed part of the Houston Ship Channel to vessel
traffic near Baytown, Texas, after 11 Greenpeace USA protesters
suspended themselves by cables over the key oil export waterway.
The closure of one portion of the channel, which stretches
53 miles (85 km) from its entrance in the Gulf of Mexico to the
Port of Houston, blocked tanker ship traffic to and from five
major oil refineries as well as chemical and oil-export
terminals.
In Twitter messages posted by Greenpeace USA, protesters can
be seen dangling on harnesses from the bridge over the waterway,
with large yellow banners flapping in the wind.
"We're in the heart of the fossil fuel industry (the largest
oil export channel in the U.S.) to confront Trump & the oil
industry," one tweet said. "It is time to end the age of oil,"
said another.
The protest came hours ahead of a planned debate in Houston
by 10 Democratic White House contenders that has drawn national
media to the fourth-largest U.S. city.
Just one ship was waiting to enter the busiest U.S.
petrochemical port, and two ships were waiting to exit the
waterway, the Coast Guard said.
The area affected by the closing is near Exxon Mobil Corp's
560,500-barrel-per-day refinery in Baytown, which is 26
miles (42 km) east of Houston.
Production at the refinery was unaffected by the channel
closure, people familiar with the matter told Reuters. The
Baytown refinery is the fourth-largest in the United States and
Exxon's largest in the country.
Other refiners along the channel affected by the shutdown
included Valero Energy Corp's 205,000-bpd Houston
refinery, LyondellBasell's 263,776-bpd Houston refinery,
Chevron Corp's 112,229-bpd Pasadena, Texas, refinery and
Royal Dutch Shell Plc's 340,000-bpd Deer Park, Texas,
refinery.
All of the refineries are able to ship out products via
pipelines and most have enough crude on hand to continue
operating at maximum capacity for several days.
The channel was closed from Light 102A to Light 104, the
Coast Guard said in a notice. Ship traffic to Texas City, Texas,
where two refineries and several chemical plants are located,
was not affected by the closure on the upper Ship Channel.
(Reporting by Erwin Seba in Houston and Swati Verma in
Bengaluru ; Editing by Bernadette Baum)
