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Commitments and Contingencies | 9 Months Ended
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Sep. 30, 2022
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract] |
Commitments and Contingencies | Commitments and Contingencies In the ordinary course of business, we are a party to various lawsuits and other contingent matters. We establish accruals for specific legal matters when we determine that the likelihood of an unfavorable outcome is probable and the loss is reasonably estimable. It is possible that an unfavorable outcome of one or more of these lawsuits or other contingencies could have a material impact on our financial condition, results of operations, or cash flows. Tax and Related Matters We are also party to various other legal proceedings, claims, and regulatory, tax or government audits, inquiries and investigations that arise in the ordinary course of business. For example, during the first quarter of 2022 we received a tax assessment in the amount of $1.4 million from the Washington Department of Revenue related to its audit of certain taxes allegedly payable on certain sales of raw vacuum gas oil that occurred between 2014 and 2016. We believe the Department of Revenue’s interpretation is in conflict with its prior guidance and we intend to appeal. By opinion dated September 22, 2021, the Hawaii Attorney General reversed a prior 1964 opinion exempting various business transactions conducted in Hawaii free trade zones from certain state taxes. We and other similarly situated state taxpayers who had previously claimed such exemptions are currently being audited for such prior tax periods. Similarly, on September 30, 2021, we received notice of a complaint filed on May 17, 2021, on camera and under seal in the first circuit court of the state of Hawaii alleging that Par Hawaii Refining, LLC, Par Pacific Holdings, Inc. and certain unnamed defendants made false claims and statements in connection with various state tax returns related to our business conducted within the Hawaii free trade zones, and seeking unspecified damages, penalties, interest and injunctive relief. We dispute the allegations in the complaint and intend to vigorously defend ourselves in such proceeding. We believe the likelihood of an unfavorable outcome in these matters to be neither probable nor reasonably estimable. Environmental Matters Like other petroleum refiners, our operations are subject to extensive and periodically-changing federal, state, and local environmental laws and regulations governing air emissions, wastewater discharges, and solid and hazardous waste management activities. Many of these regulations are becoming increasingly stringent and the cost of compliance can be expected to increase over time. Periodically, we receive communications from various federal, state, and local governmental authorities asserting violations of environmental laws and/or regulations. These governmental entities may also propose or assess fines or require corrective actions for these asserted violations. Except as disclosed below, we do not anticipate that any such matters currently asserted will have a material impact on our financial condition, results of operations, or cash flows. Wyoming Refinery Our Wyoming refinery is subject to a number of consent decrees, orders, and settlement agreements involving the EPA and/or the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, some of which date back to the late 1970s and several of which remain in effect, requiring further actions at the Wyoming refinery. The largest cost component arising from these various decrees relates to the investigation, monitoring, and remediation of soil, groundwater, surface water, and sediment contamination associated with the facility’s historic operations. Investigative work by Wyoming Refining and negotiations with the relevant agencies as to remedial approaches remain ongoing on a number of aspects of the contamination, meaning that investigation, monitoring, and remediation costs are not reasonably estimable for some elements of these efforts. As of September 30, 2022, we have accrued $15.0 million for the well-understood components of these efforts based on current information, approximately one-third of which we expect to incur in the next five years and the remainder to be incurred over approximately 30 years. Additionally, we believe the Wyoming refinery will need to modify or close a series of wastewater impoundments in the next several years and replace those impoundments with a new wastewater treatment system. Based on current information, reasonable estimates we have received suggest costs of approximately $11.6 million to design and construct a new wastewater treatment system. Finally, among the various historic consent decrees, orders, and settlement agreements into which Wyoming Refining has entered, there are several penalty orders associated with exceedances of permitted limits by the Wyoming refinery’s wastewater discharges. Although the frequency of these exceedances has declined over time, Wyoming Refining may become subject to new penalty enforcement action in the next several years, which could involve penalties in excess of $300,000. Regulation of Greenhouse Gases The EPA regulates greenhouse gases (“GHG”) under the federal Clean Air Act (“CAA”). New construction or material expansions that meet certain GHG emissions thresholds will likely require that, among other things, a GHG permit be issued in accordance with the federal CAA regulations and we will be required, in connection with such permitting, to undertake a technology review to determine appropriate controls to be implemented with the project in order to reduce GHG emissions. Furthermore, the EPA is currently developing refinery-specific GHG regulations and performance standards that are expected to impose GHG emission limits and/or technology requirements. These control requirements may affect a wide range of refinery operations. Any such controls could result in material increased compliance costs, additional operating restrictions for our business, and an increase in the cost of the products we produce, which could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition, results of operations, or cash flows. Additionally, the EPA’s final rule updating standards that control toxic air emissions from petroleum refineries imposed additional controls and monitoring requirements on flaring operations, storage tanks, sulfur recovery units, delayed coking units, and required fenceline monitoring. Compliance with this rule has not had a material impact on our financial condition, results of operations, or cash flows to date. Several states have also passed legislation related to GHGs. For example, in 2021, the State of Washington passed climate legislation requiring fuel suppliers to gradually reduce the carbon intensity of transportation fuels to 20 percent below 2017 levels by 2038 and subjecting entities that emit significant amounts of carbon dioxide, such as fuel suppliers, to a cap-and-trade system for reducing GHG emissions beginning January 1, 2023. In 2007, the State of Hawaii passed Act 234, which required that GHG emissions be rolled back on a statewide basis to 1990 levels by the year 2020. In June of 2014, the Hawaii Department of Health (“DOH”) adopted regulations that require each major facility to reduce CO 2 emissions by 16% by 2020 relative to a calendar year 2010 baseline (the first year in which GHG emissions were reported to the EPA under 40 CFR Part 98). The Hawaii refinery’s capacity to materially reduce fuel use and GHG emissions is limited because most energy conservation measures have already been implemented over the past 20 years. The regulation allows for “partnering” with other facilities (principally power plants) that have already dramatically reduced greenhouse emissions or are on schedule to reduce CO 2 emissions in order to comply independently with the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standards. Accordingly, our Hawaii refinery submitted a GHG reduction plan that incorporates the partnering provisions and demonstrates that additional reductions are not cost-effective or necessary because of the Hawaii refinery’s baseline allocation and because the State of Hawaii has already reached the 1990 levels according to a report prepared by the DOH in January 2019. Compliance with federal and state GHG regulations could result in material increased compliance costs and an increase in the cost of our products. In 2007, the U.S. Congress passed the Energy Independence and Security Act (the “EISA”) which, among other things, set a target fuel economy standard of 35 miles per gallon for the combined fleet of cars and light trucks in the U.S. by model year 2020 and contained an expanded Renewable Fuel Standard (the “RFS”). In August 2012, the EPA and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (“NHTSA”) jointly adopted regulations that establish vehicle carbon dioxide emissions standards and an average industry fuel economy of 54.5 miles per gallon by model year 2025. On August 8, 2018, the EPA and NHTSA jointly proposed to revise existing fuel economy standards for model years 2021-2025 and to set standards for 2026 for the first time. On March 31, 2020, the agencies released updated fuel economy and vehicle emissions standards, which provide for an increase in stringency by 1.5% each year through model year 2026, as compared with the standards issued in 2012 that required 5% annual increases. Higher fuel economy standards have the potential to reduce demand for our refined transportation fuel products. Under EISA, the RFS requires an increasing amount of renewable fuel to be blended into the nation’s transportation fuel supply. Over time, higher annual RFS requirements have the potential to reduce demand for our refined transportation fuel products. In the near term, the RFS will be satisfied primarily with fuel ethanol blended into gasoline. We, and other refiners subject to the RFS, may meet the RFS requirements by blending the necessary volumes of renewable fuels produced by us or purchased from third parties. To the extent that refiners will not or cannot blend renewable fuels into the products they produce in the quantities required to satisfy their obligations under the RFS program, those refiners must purchase renewable credits, referred to as RINs, to maintain compliance. To the extent that we exceed the minimum volumetric requirements for blending of renewable fuels, we have the option of retaining these RINs for current or future RFS compliance or selling those RINs on the open market. As of September 30, 2022, our estimate of the renewable volume obligation (“RVO”) liability for the 2021 and 2022 compliance years is based on the RFS volumetric requirements which the EPA finalized on June 3, 2022. Additionally, the RFS enables the EPA to exempt certain small refineries from the renewable fuels blending requirements in the event such requirements would cause disproportionate economic hardship to that refinery. We petitioned the EPA for a small refinery waiver for certain of our refineries for 2019-2020, but in January 2021, the EPA announced it would cease granting hardship exemptions to small refineries that had not received continuous exemptions since 2011. In HollyFrontier Cheyenne Refining, LLC v. Renewable Fuels Association, the United States Supreme Court recently held that the CAA authorizes the EPA to exempt a small refinery from compliance with the renewable fuel standards program even if the small refinery had not received an exemption in each year since the program began in 2011. On June 3, 2022, the EPA denied our pending small refinery exemption applications for 2019-2020. The RFS may present production and logistics challenges for both the renewable fuels and petroleum refining and marketing industries in that we may have to enter into arrangements with other parties or purchase D3 waivers from the EPA to meet our obligations to use advanced biofuels, including biomass-based diesel and cellulosic biofuel, with potentially uncertain supplies of these new fuels. In October 2010, the EPA issued a partial waiver decision under the federal CAA to allow for an increase in the amount of ethanol permitted to be blended into gasoline from 10% (“E10”) to 15% (“E15”) for 2007 and newer light duty motor vehicles. In 2019, the EPA approved year-round sales of E15. On July 2, 2021, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated the EPA’s approval of year-round E15 sales. However, on April 29, 2022, in response to supply challenges caused in part by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the EPA issued an emergency waiver to permit E15 sales during the summer of 2022. There are numerous issues, including state and federal regulatory issues, that need to be addressed before E15 can be marketed on a large scale for use in traditional gasoline engines; however, increased renewable fuel in the nation’s transportation fuel supply could reduce demand for our refined products. In March 2014, the EPA published a final Tier 3 gasoline standard that requires, among other things, that gasoline contain no more than 10 parts per million (“ppm”) sulfur on an annual average basis and no more than 80 ppm sulfur on a per-gallon basis. The standard also lowers the allowable benzene, aromatics, and olefins content of gasoline. The effective date for the new standard was January 1, 2017, however, approved small volume refineries had until January 1, 2020 to meet the standard. The Par East Hawaii refinery was required to comply with Tier 3 gasoline standards within 30 months of June 21, 2016. On March 19, 2015, the EPA confirmed the small refinery status of our Wyoming refinery. The Par East Hawaii refinery, our Wyoming refinery, and our Washington refinery, acquired in January 2019, were all granted small refinery status by the EPA for 2018. All of our refineries are compliant with the final Tier 3 gasoline standard. Beginning on June 30, 2014, new sulfur standards for fuel oil used by marine vessels operating within 200 miles of the U.S. coastline (which includes the entire Hawaiian Island chain) were lowered from 10,000 ppm (1%) to 1,000 ppm (0.1%). The sulfur standards began at the Hawaii refinery and were phased in so that by January 1, 2015, they were to be fully aligned with the International Marine Organization (“IMO”) standards and deadline. The more stringent standards apply universally to both U.S. and foreign-flagged ships. Although the marine fuel regulations provided vessel operators with a few compliance options such as installation of on-board pollution controls and demonstration unavailability, many vessel operators will be forced to switch to a distillate fuel while operating within the Emission Control Area (“ECA”). Beyond the 200 mile ECA, large ocean vessels are still allowed to burn marine fuel with up to 3.5% sulfur. Our Hawaii refinery is capable of producing the 1% sulfur residual fuel oil that was previously required within the ECA. Although our Hawaii refinery remains in a position to supply vessels traveling to and through Hawaii, the market for 0.1% sulfur distillate fuel and 3.5% sulfur residual fuel is much more competitive. In addition to U.S. fuels requirements, the IMO has also adopted newer standards that further reduce the global limit on sulfur content in maritime fuels to 0.5% beginning in 2020 (“IMO 2020”). Environmental Agreement On September 25, 2013, Par Petroleum, LLC (formerly Hawaii Pacific Energy, a wholly owned subsidiary of Par created for purposes of the acquisition of PHR), Tesoro Corporation (“Tesoro”), and PHR entered into an Environmental Agreement (“Environmental Agreement”) that allocated responsibility for known and contingent environmental liabilities related to the acquisition of PHR, including a consent decree. Indemnification In addition to its obligation to reimburse us for capital expenditures incurred pursuant to a consent decree, Tesoro agreed to indemnify us for claims and losses arising out of related breaches of Tesoro’s representations, warranties, and covenants in the Environmental Agreement, certain defined “corrective actions” relating to pre-existing environmental conditions, third-party claims arising under environmental laws for personal injury or property damage arising out of or relating to releases of hazardous materials that occurred prior to the date of the closing of the PHR acquisition, any fine, penalty, or other cost assessed by a governmental authority in connection with violations of environmental laws by PHR prior to the date of the closing of the PHR acquisition, certain groundwater remediation work, fines, or penalties imposed on PHR by a consent decree related to acts or omissions of Tesoro prior to the date of the closing of the PHR acquisition, and claims and losses related to the Pearl City Superfund Site. Tesoro’s indemnification obligations are subject to certain limitations as set forth in the Environmental Agreement. These limitations include a deductible of $1 million and a cap of $15 million for certain of Tesoro’s indemnification obligations related to certain pre-existing conditions, as well as certain restrictions regarding the time limits for submitting notice and supporting documentation for remediation actions. Recovery Trusts We emerged from the reorganization of Delta Petroleum Corporation (“Delta”) on August 31, 2012 (“Emergence Date”), when the plan of reorganization (“Plan”) was consummated. On the Emergence Date, we formed the Delta Petroleum General Recovery Trust (“General Trust”). The General Trust was formed to pursue certain litigation against third parties, including preference actions, fraudulent transfer and conveyance actions, rights of setoff and other claims, or causes of action under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code and other claims and potential claims that Delta and its subsidiaries (collectively, “Debtors”) hold against third parties. On February 27, 2018, the Bankruptcy Court entered its final decree closing the Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases of Delta and the other Debtors, discharging the trustee for the General Trust, and finding that all assets of the General Trust were resolved, abandoned, or liquidated and have been distributed in accordance with the requirements of the Plan. In addition, the final decree required the Company or the General Trust, as applicable, to maintain the current accruals owed on account of the remaining claims of the U.S. Government and Noble Energy, Inc. As of September 30, 2022, two related claims totaling approximately $22.4 million remained to be resolved and we have accrued approximately $0.5 million representing the estimated value of claims remaining to be settled which are deemed probable and estimable at period end. One of the two remaining claims was filed by the U.S. Government for approximately $22.4 million relating to ongoing litigation concerning a plugging and abandonment obligation in Pacific Outer Continental Shelf Lease OCS-P 0320, comprising part of the Sword Unit in the Santa Barbara Channel, California. The second unliquidated claim, which is related to the same plugging and abandonment obligation, was filed by Noble Energy Inc., the operator and majority interest owner of the Sword Unit. We believe the probability of issuing stock to satisfy the full claim amount is remote, as the obligations upon which such proof of claim is asserted are joint and several among all working interest owners and Delta, our predecessor, only owned an approximate 3.4% aggregate working interest in the unit. The settlement of claims is subject to ongoing litigation and we are unable to predict with certainty how many shares will be required to satisfy all claims. Pursuant to the Plan, allowed claims are settled at a ratio of 54.4 shares per $1,000 of claim.

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