It’s official! On Thursday, a federal judge finally confirmed the Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan of Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES), the company that ran the benzene-polluting mega refinery that closed after bursting into flames last June.
The plan includes the sale of PES’s 1,300-acre refinery complex to a real estate company called Hilco — putting an end to the bizarre (and yet somehow unsurprising) efforts of the presidential administration to make sure the property continued its crude ways.
The PES refinery will now be permanently shut down and most likely be redeveloped as a mixed-use property. Philly Thrive — the grassroots environmental justice group that has been fighting against the refinery for years — said it looks forward to working with Hilco in determining the future of the land.
