This bill summary was last updated January 29, 2025.
Portland’s Critical Energy Infrastructure (CEI) hub is located along a six mile stretch of the Willamette River, northwest of downtown. The CEI hub is a storage site for approximately 90% of Oregon’s liquid petroleum and biofuels, about 360 million gallons in all, but it is located on unstable soil and represents a major hazard in case of a large earthquake.
Previously, SB 1567 (2022) required owner/operators of CEI hub and other industrial facilities that transport or store liquid fuels to conduct comprehensive seismic vulnerability assessments, and to implement hazard mitigation plans after they are approved by Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality (ODEQ).
SB 1567 also required Oregon’s Department of Energy (ODOE) to develop an Energy Security Plan for the state. That plan was published in September of 2024. The Energy Security Plan includes recommendations for increasing the geographic diversity of fuel storage capacity throughout the state, including an evaluation of strategies to overcome barriers to geographic distribution. It provides a thorough assessment of fuel storage across the state, including analysis of sites that could be used to provide geographic diversity.
The present bill now requires ODOE to develop an Energy Storage Transition Plan specifically for the CEI hub, in consultation with industry stakeholders, technical experts and other interested parties. The Plan must describe short, medium and long-term goals to ensure the resilience of Oregon’s energy sector, and must be submitted to the legislature no later than September 15, 2026. This bill presumably asks ODOE to draw on its published Energy Security Plan to determine how CEI hub fuels might instead be stored at other sites that are less seismically vulnerable.
The Energy Storage Transition Plan must also assess the potential for owner/operators of CEI hub facilities to obtain insurance or risk bonds to cover the costs associated with a catastrophic release of fuels as a result of an earthquake. [Note that this provision clearly overlaps with LC 2550]