Sunoco
Encyclopedia
Sunoco Inc. is an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 petroleum
Petroleum
Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...

 and petrochemical
Petrochemical
Petrochemicals are chemical products derived from petroleum. Some chemical compounds made from petroleum are also obtained from other fossil fuels, such as coal or natural gas, or renewable sources such as corn or sugar cane....

 manufacturer headquartered in Philadelphia
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...

, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, formerly known as Sun Company Inc. (1886–1920 and 1976–1998) and Sun Oil Co. (1920–1976).

Sunoco is one of the largest gasoline distribution companies in the United States, with Sunoco brand gasoline being sold in over 4,700 outlets; just over a third of these outlets are Sunoco gas stations and convenience stores, located in 26 states.

Sunoco is a Fortune 100 Company. It is also the biggest company based in Philadelphia and the 2nd biggest in Pennsylvania behind AmerisourceBergen
AmerisourceBergen
AmerisourceBergen Corporation is a Chesterbrook, PA based Drug Wholesale company that was formed by the merger of Bergen Brunswig and AmeriSource in 2001...

. Its headquarters are located in the BNY Mellon Center in Center City Philadelphia.

In Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, Sunoco was operated by Suncor Energy
Suncor Energy
Suncor Energy Inc. is a Canadian integrated energy company based in Calgary, Alberta. It specializes in production of synthetic crude from oil sands...

, a separate Canadian entity. In 2010, all Sunoco outlets were converted to Petro-Canada
Petro-Canada
Petro-Canada was a crown corporation of Canada in the field of oil and natural gas. It was headquartered in the Petro-Canada Centre in Calgary, Alberta. In August, 2009, Petro-Canada merged with Suncor Energy, a deal in which Suncor investors received approximately 60 per cent ownership of the...

 outlets.

In 2011, Sunoco announced that it would exit the refinery business and try to sell its last two refineries.

1800s to 1900s: founding and growth

The integrated oil company now known as Sunoco began as The Peoples Natural Gas Company in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...

. In 1886, its partners – Joseph Newton Pew
The Pew Charitable Trusts
The Pew Charitable Trusts is an independent non-profit, non-governmental organization , founded in 1948. With over US$5 billion in assets, its current mission is to serve the public interest by "improving public policy, informing the public, and stimulating civic life."-History:The Trusts, a single...

, Philip Pisano and Edward O. Emerson – decided to expand their gas business with a stake in the new oil discoveries in Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

 and Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

. Four years later, the growing enterprise became the Sun Oil Company of Ohio. Sun Oil diversified quickly, active in production and distribution of oil as well as processing and marketing refined products. By 1901, the company was incorporated in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

 as Sun Company and turned its interest to the new Spindletop
Spindletop
Spindletop is a salt dome oil field located in the southern portion of Beaumont, Texas in the United States. The Spindletop dome was derived from the Louann Salt evaporite layer of the Jurassic geologic period. On January 10, 1901, a well at Spindletop struck oil . The new oil field soon produced...

 field in Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

. Pew's sons, J. Howard Pew
J. Howard Pew
J. Howard Pew was an American philanthropist and co-founder of Sunoco .Joseph Howard Pew was born in Bradford, Pennsylvania in 1882 and raised as a devout Presbyterian. In 1886 Pew’s father, Joseph Newton Pew, Sr. started an oil business in Pennsylvania, expanding to Texas when oil was discovered...

 and Joseph N. Pew, Jr.
Joseph N. Pew, Jr.
Joseph Newton Pew, Jr. was an American industrialist and influential member of the Republican Party.-Early life:...

 would take over the company after their father's death.

With a growing portfolio of oil fields and refineries in hand, Sun opened its first service station in Ardmore, Pennsylvania
Ardmore, Pennsylvania
Ardmore is a census-designated place in Delaware and Montgomery counties in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The population was 12,455 at the 2010 census...

 in 1920. The name changed back to Sun Oil Company in 1922 and, in 1925, Sun became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange
New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located at 11 Wall Street in Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed companies at 13.39 trillion as of Dec 2010...

. Following World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Sun expanded internationally. Its first Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 refinery was built in 1953 in Sarnia, Ontario
Sarnia, Ontario
Sarnia is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada . It is the largest city on Lake Huron and is located where the upper Great Lakes empty into the St. Clair River....

, home to a burgeoning new petrochemical industry. Sun established a facility at Venezuela's
Venezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...

 Lake Maracaibo
Lake Maracaibo
Lake Maracaibo is a large brackish bay in Venezuela at . It is connected to the Gulf of Venezuela by Tablazo Strait at the northern end, and fed by numerous rivers, the largest being the Catatumbo. It is commonly considered a lake rather than a bay or lagoon, and at 13,210 km² it would be the...

 in 1957, which produced over a billion barrels (160,000,000 m³) before the operation was nationalized in 1975.

Custom blending

Sunoco is perhaps best known to consumers for its "custom blending" pumps, an innovation that, beginning in 1956, allowed customers of Sunoco service stations to choose from several octane grades
Octane rating
Octane rating or octane number is a standard measure of the anti-knock properties of a motor or aviation fuel. The higher the octane number, the more compression the fuel can withstand before detonating...

 through a single pump. Sunoco stations offered as many as eight grades of "Custom Blended" gasolines from its "Dial A Grade" pumps ranging from subregular Sunoco 190 to Sunoco 260, the latter a super-premium grade of 102 octane that was advertised as the "highest octane pump gas" and very popular with the 400 horsepower V8(299 kW) muscle cars of the 1960s.

1960s to 2000s: acquisitions and branding

In 1967, Sun established its Great Canadian Oil Sands Limited facility in northern Alberta
Alberta
Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, to help unlock the estimated 300 billion barrels (48 km³) of recoverable oil in the Athabasca oil sands
Athabasca Oil Sands
The Athabasca oil sands are large deposits of bitumen, or extremely heavy crude oil, located in northeastern Alberta, Canada - roughly centred on the boomtown of Fort McMurray...

.

In 1968, Sun Oil merged with Tulsa, OK
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Tulsa is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 46th-largest city in the United States. With a population of 391,906 as of the 2010 census, it is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with 937,478 residents in the MSA and 988,454 in the CSA. Tulsa's...

-based Sunray DX Oil Company, which refined and marketed gasoline under the DX brand in several midwestern states, and included several refineries including one in Tulsa that was operated by Sun until its sale was completed in June 2009 to Holly Corporation of Dallas, Texas. This move expanded Sun's marketing area into the mid-continent region.

Sun Oil continued marketing its petroleum products under both the Sunoco and DX brands through the 1970s and into the 1980s. In the late 1980s, Sun began rebranding DX stations in the Midwest to the Sunoco brand and even introduced the high-octane Sunoco ULTRA 94 gasoline to stations in that region, but by the early 1990s, they pulled out of virtually all areas in the southeastern U.S. and west of the Mississippi, resulting in the closing and rebranding of service stations and jobbers to other brands in those areas, notably Sinclair
Sinclair Oil
Sinclair Oil Corporation is an American petroleum corporation, founded by Harry F. Sinclair on May 1, 1916 as the Sinclair Oil & Refining Corporation by combining the assets of 11 small petroleum companies. Originally a New York corporation, Sinclair Oil reincorporated in Wyoming in 1976...

 in Oklahoma.

With increased diversification, Sun Oil Company was renamed Sun Company in 1976. In 1980, Sun acquired the U.S. oil and gas properties of Texas Pacific Oil Company, Inc., a subsidiary of The Seagram
Seagram
The Seagram Company Ltd. was a large corporation headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, Canada that was the largest distiller of alcoholic beverages in the world. Toward the end of its independent existence it also controlled various entertainment and other business ventures...

 Company, Ltd., for US$2.3 billion—the second largest acquisition in U.S. history to that date.

Through the 1980s, Sun developed oil interests in the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...

 and offshore China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

 and expanded its holdings in both oil and coal with additional U.S. business acquisitions. In 1983, consumers saw the arrival of Sunoco ULTRA 94, the market's highest octane unleaded gasoline. Then in 1988, Sun undertook a major restructuring to segregate its domestic oil and gas exploration and production business and the focus the company on its refining and marketing business. This led to the acquisition of Atlantic Refining and Marketing (and, in effect, that company's convenience store
Convenience store
A convenience store, corner store, corner shop, commonly called a bodega in Spanish-speaking areas of the United States, is a small store or shop in a built up area that stocks a range of everyday items such as groceries, toiletries, alcoholic and soft drinks, and may also offer money order and...

 chain, A-Plus
A-Plus
APlus is an American convenience store chain owned & operated by Sunoco, Inc.The chain began life as the convenience store chain for Atlantic Petroleum in 1985, which was spun off from ARCO, Inc...

), including its Philadelphia refinery which was later merged with the former Gulf Oil
Gulf Oil
Gulf Oil was a major global oil company from the 1900s to the 1980s. The eighth-largest American manufacturing company in 1941 and the ninth-largest in 1979, Gulf Oil was one of the so-called Seven Sisters oil companies...

 refinery next door that Sunoco acquired from Chevron
Chevron Corporation
Chevron Corporation is an American multinational energy corporation headquartered in San Ramon, California, United States and active in more than 180 countries. It is engaged in every aspect of the oil, gas, and geothermal energy industries, including exploration and production; refining,...

.

By the 1990s, Sun had departed the international exploration business and was fully dedicated to its branded products and services. Sun sold its remaining interest in Canada's Suncor Energy
Suncor Energy
Suncor Energy Inc. is a Canadian integrated energy company based in Calgary, Alberta. It specializes in production of synthetic crude from oil sands...

 in 1995, but co-operates two refineries – in Toledo, Ohio
Toledo, Ohio
Toledo is the fourth most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Lucas County. Toledo is in northwest Ohio, on the western end of Lake Erie, and borders the State of Michigan...

, and Sarnia, Ontario
Sarnia, Ontario
Sarnia is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada . It is the largest city on Lake Huron and is located where the upper Great Lakes empty into the St. Clair River....

 – in joint ventures. In 1998, Sun Company, Inc. became Sunoco, Inc.

By 1998, Sun had acquired Allied Signal, Inc. chemical plants. Allied Signal, Inc. being on the stock exchange sold half of the company to Honeywell, Inc. and the other half to Sunoco, Inc. The chemical portion of the business was called "Sunoco Chemicals, Inc."

In 2003, the Speedway SuperAmerica
Speedway SuperAmerica
Speedway LLC is the operator of a chain of combination gas stations and convenience stores in the Midwest and South of the United States operating under the Speedway brand name. Speedway LLC is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Marathon Petroleum Company...

 chain of gas stations and convenience stores exited the southeast United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and sold most of their operations to Sunoco. Shortly prior to this, Sunoco acquired many service stations from Coastal Petroleum, especially its stations in Florida. This has led to the reintroduction of the Sunoco brand to areas it pulled out of ten years earlier.

In 2004, Sunoco replaced ConocoPhillips
ConocoPhillips
ConocoPhillips Company is an American multinational energy corporation with its headquarters located in the Energy Corridor district of Houston, Texas in the United States...

' 76 brand as the official fuel of NASCAR
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing is a family-owned and -operated business venture that sanctions and governs multiple auto racing sports events. It was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1947–48. As of 2009, the CEO for the company is Brian France, grandson of the late Bill France Sr...

.

After ConocoPhillips abandoned the marketing of the Mobil
Mobil
Mobil, previously known as the Socony-Vacuum Oil Company, was a major American oil company which merged with Exxon in 1999 to form ExxonMobil. Today Mobil continues as a major brand name within the combined company, as well as still being a gas station sometimes paired with their own store or On...

 brand name in the Washington, DC, area, Sunoco purchased these rights, and has since been converting Maryland and Virginia Mobil stations to the Sunoco brand, bringing the A-Plus convenience store with them – prior to this, these stations had convenience stores under the Circle K
Circle K
Circle K is an international chain of convenience stores, founded in 1951, in El Paso, Texas, United States. It is owned and operated by the Canadian-based Alimentation Couche-Tard.-Overview:...

 or On the Run
On the Run (convenience store)
thumb|350px|An Esso-branded service station, with On the Run convenience store, in [[Ottawa]], [[Ontario]], [[Canada]]. This location, owned by [[Imperial Oil]], includes a [[Tim Hortons]] drive-thru and an [[Royal Bank of Canada|RBC]] bank machine....

 brands. Most of the conversions done so far have been in Virginia.

In September 2009, Sunoco announced the sale of its retail heating oil
Heating oil
Heating oil, or oil heat, is a low viscosity, flammable liquid petroleum product used as a fuel for furnaces or boilers in buildings. Home heating oil is often abbreviated as HHO...

 and propane
Propane
Propane is a three-carbon alkane with the molecular formula , normally a gas, but compressible to a transportable liquid. A by-product of natural gas processing and petroleum refining, it is commonly used as a fuel for engines, oxy-gas torches, barbecues, portable stoves, and residential central...

 distribution business to Superior Plus Corp for $82.5 million in cash.

In October 2009, Sunoco announced it will idle and possibly permanently shut down its Eagle Point/ Westville, NJ plant, laying off over 400 employees.

In March 2011, Sunoco announced plans to spin off its SunCoke Energy unit in a $100 mm IPO.

Effective 6 September 2011, Sunoco announced that it will exit the crude oil refining business and seeks to sell its Philadelphia and Marcus Hook refineries.

Gasoline sales

Sunoco is the only major gasoline retailer to sell four grades of gasoline in the U.S., due to its proprietary pumps which blend regular with Ultra93 to obtain the mid-grades, with octane ratings in parentheses:
  • Regular (87)
  • Plus (89)
  • Premium (91)
  • Ultra93 (formerly Ultra94; Sunoco began phasing out the 94 octane gasoline in the first decade of the 21st century).


Sunoco also once sold Economy unleaded, an 86 octane slightly cheaper than regular, in all of its markets until the mid-1990s when it was withdrawn from Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

 and a handful of other states, and was phased out altogether in 2003.

Up until the early 1980s, Sunoco used a numbering system to market its then-five grades of leaded gasoline, and a rotary lever on the pump was used to select the grade and blend the lowest-octane gasoline with the highest-octane gasoline to obtain the proper octane, with the resulting octane (R+M/2 method) in parentheses (originally, the "missing" grades were available, too - 210, 230, and 250):
  • 190 - Economy (87)
  • 200 - Regular (89)
  • 220 - Plus (92)
  • 240 - Premium (94)
  • 260 - Super 260 (96; originally 97.5))

Exclusive deals

In addition to their sponsorship deal with NASCAR
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing is a family-owned and -operated business venture that sanctions and governs multiple auto racing sports events. It was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1947–48. As of 2009, the CEO for the company is Brian France, grandson of the late Bill France Sr...

, Sunoco also has exclusive deals as the gasoline supplier at the travel plazas along the Pennsylvania Turnpike
Pennsylvania Turnpike
The Pennsylvania Turnpike is a toll highway system operated by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States. The three sections of the turnpike system total . The main section extends from Ohio to New Jersey and is long...

 , New Jersey Turnpike
New Jersey Turnpike
The New Jersey Turnpike is a toll road in New Jersey, maintained by the New Jersey Turnpike Authority. According to the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association, the Turnpike is the nation's sixth-busiest toll road and is among one of the most heavily traveled highways in the United...

, Atlantic City Expressway
Atlantic City Expressway
The Atlantic City Expressway is a , controlled-access toll road in New Jersey, managed and operated by the South Jersey Transportation Authority...

, Palisades Parkway, and Delaware Turnpike
Delaware Turnpike
The Delaware Turnpike, also known as the John F. Kennedy Memorial Highway, is an tolled highway that lies entirely within the state of Delaware. Running in a general southwest to northeast direction, paralleling nearby U.S...

. In 2011, Sunoco acquired the rights to operate the nine plazas on the Garden State Parkway
Garden State Parkway
The Garden State Parkway is a 172.4-mile limited-access toll parkway that stretches the length of New Jersey from the New York line at Montvale, New Jersey, to Cape May at New Jersey's southernmost tip. Its name refers to New Jersey's nickname, the "Garden State." Most New Jersey residents refer...

, and also signed a new contract to operate the 16 plazas on the Ohio Turnpike
Ohio Turnpike
The Ohio Turnpike, officially the James W. Shocknessy Ohio Turnpike, is a -long, limited-access toll highway in the U.S. state of Ohio, serving as a primary corridor to Chicago and Pittsburgh...

 beginning in 2012. In addition, Sunoco also owns & operates a station with an A-Plus
A-Plus
APlus is an American convenience store chain owned & operated by Sunoco, Inc.The chain began life as the convenience store chain for Atlantic Petroleum in 1985, which was spun off from ARCO, Inc...

 convenience store
Convenience store
A convenience store, corner store, corner shop, commonly called a bodega in Spanish-speaking areas of the United States, is a small store or shop in a built up area that stocks a range of everyday items such as groceries, toiletries, alcoholic and soft drinks, and may also offer money order and...

 at Pittsburgh International Airport
Pittsburgh International Airport
Pittsburgh International Airport , formerly Greater Pittsburgh Airport, Greater Pittsburgh International Airport and commonly referred to as Pittsburgh International, is a joint civil–military international airport located in the Pittsburgh suburb of Findlay Township, approximately west of...

, as Sunoco has a very large market share in Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...

. Sunoco also operates some of the filling stations on the New York Thruway.

Sunoco will become the official fuel of the Izod IndyCar Series
IndyCar Series
The IZOD IndyCar Series is the premier level of American open wheel racing. The current championship, founded by Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Tony George, began in 1996 as a competitor to CART known as the Indy Racing League . Citing CART's increasing reliance on expensive machinery and...

 beginning in 2011.

Exit from refinery business

In 2011, Sunoco announced that it would leave the refinery business, stating that it had been losing money on these operations since 2009. It would close and attempt to sell its last two refineries: Philadelphia and Marcus Hook. Previously, Sunoco sold its refinery in Toledo, Ohio
Toledo, Ohio
Toledo is the fourth most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Lucas County. Toledo is in northwest Ohio, on the western end of Lake Erie, and borders the State of Michigan...

 to PBF Energy Company, LLC.

Environmental record

Among oil corporations, Sunoco is listed as the most environmentally responsible in the latest version of the Sierra Club
Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is the oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. It was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by the conservationist and preservationist John Muir, who became its first president...

's Updated Environmentalist's Guide to Gasoline. Sunoco is also the only oil company to sign the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES) principal and as part of this agreement, Sunoco has made all of its environmental activities—both successes and failures—publicly available.

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst
University of Massachusetts Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst is a public research and land-grant university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States and the flagship of the University of Massachusetts system...

 have identified Sunoco as the 55th-largest corporate producer of air pollution
Air pollution
Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

 in the United States, with roughly 1.7 million pounds of toxic chemicals released annually into the air. Major pollutants indicated by the study include nickel
Nickel
Nickel is a chemical element with the chemical symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge. Nickel belongs to the transition metals and is hard and ductile...

 compounds, naphthalene
Naphthalene
Naphthalene is an organic compound with formula . It is a white crystalline solid with a characteristic odor that is detectable at concentrations as low as 0.08 ppm by mass. As an aromatic hydrocarbon, naphthalene's structure consists of a fused pair of benzene rings...

, aniline
Aniline
Aniline, phenylamine or aminobenzene is an organic compound with the formula C6H5NH2. Consisting of a phenyl group attached to an amino group, aniline is the prototypical aromatic amine. Being a precursor to many industrial chemicals, its main use is in the manufacture of precursors to polyurethane...

, and benzene
Benzene
Benzene is an organic chemical compound. It is composed of 6 carbon atoms in a ring, with 1 hydrogen atom attached to each carbon atom, with the molecular formula C6H6....

.

See also

  • 1975 Philadelphia Refinery Fire
    1975 Philadelphia Refinery Fire
    A refinery owned by Gulf Oil Corporation in Philadelphia, located at Girard Point on the Schuylkill River in South Philadelphia, caught fire on August 17, 1975...

     (refinery at the time was owned by Gulf Oil
    Gulf Oil
    Gulf Oil was a major global oil company from the 1900s to the 1980s. The eighth-largest American manufacturing company in 1941 and the ninth-largest in 1979, Gulf Oil was one of the so-called Seven Sisters oil companies...

    )

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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