Sarnia

Like any business, our employees are our most loyal customers.

We have 800 workers at our Sarnia site, and the Brand Starts Here - with all of them.

Imperial’s Sarnia operations include:

• Refinery: processes mainly Canadian crude oil to produce a range of petroleum products including gasoline, aviation fuel, diesel, home heating fuel and marine fuel; capacity is approximately 121,000 barrels of crude oil per day
• Chemical plant: The Sarnia chemical plant has access to feedstocks ranging from light gases to heavy liquids, including ethane from abundant supplies of North American shale energy. We produce a wide range of products used in the manufacture of many things that we use every day, for example: polyethylene, solvents, higher olefins (often used in lubricants) and aromatics (e.g., benzene used in making dyes or synthetic detergents, and polyurethanes and xylenes used to make plastics and synthetic fibers.)
• Research centre: a world-class facility focused on supporting customers, developing and improving petroleum products and providing new technologies to improve environmental performance

Community

In all of our businesses, we make it a priority to engage with Indigenous and local communities on safety and environmental initiatives.

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Read more about our local community support our Neighbour News publications:

Neighbour News: 2020 |  2019  |  2018

Contact

General inquiries: find contact information for products and sales, customer service and more.

Sarnia community inquiries: (519) 339-4015 or via email.

Emergency contact:

• +1 519 339 5666 to report any unusual odours, sights or sounds

Follow us on Facebook for the latest information on our Sarnia site.

Imperial Sarnia supplier form

At Imperial Sarnia refinery we select quality suppliers and contractors through a comprehensive review process. Consideration includes a variety of factors including safety performance, environmental performance, service, price, technology, reliability, specifications and delivery. Learn more, and access the form, here.

Work at Sarnia

View and apply for Sarnia positions.

We seek out the best and brightest candidates to ensure the continued success of our Sarnia facility.

About 1,000 people work on the Sarnia site as engineers, lab technologists, safety planners, tradespeople, administrative staff and in many more professions. Educational requirements vary for each position and are outlined in each specific job posting. A grade twelve education or General Equivalency Diploma is a minimum requirement for all positions.

We also offer a number of skill development and networking programs to help our employees maximize their potential and enhance their job satisfaction, including: professional and skills development through in-house training, mentoring and job rotation.

Safety & emergency preparedness

Should an incident occur at the site, well-defined plans and emergency response capabilities are in place, which include access to specialized equipment and trained personnel. Our emergency teams also conduct regular drills and simulations to ensure we are always ready to respond.

Alarm testing

Our emergency warning system is a series of air horn alarms to alert our personnel of potential emergencies at the site. Alarms are tested every Monday at 12:30 p.m.

Outside of the testing period, tune to local radio stations or call the Imperial information line at +1 519 339 5666. Sign up to receive alerts to your phone or computer. Go to Sign up for important community notification alerts - BASES Website (lambtonbases.ca)

Keeping our communities safe

Click the CEPA link to read about our commitment to safe, reliable operations.

Municipal sirens

There are a number of municipal sirens in the area. Please tune to local radio stations for updates.

• Emergency procedures in the community
• Read about our safety programs and performance in the current Corporate Citizenship Report
• Imperial's Sarnia firefighters helped train their colleagues from across North America: read the article

Learn more about flaring

Environment

To responsibly meet the demand for energy we continuously look to improve technologies and practices that reduce our impact on the land, water and air. Read about our environmental performance in the current Corporate Citizenship Report

The Sarnia site has recorded a 69 percent reduction in sulphur-dioxide emissions since 2006. The elimination of coke burning and the operation of our tail-gas cleanup unit were contributing factors to our emissions reduction success. We have also reduced nitrogen-oxide emissions by 13 percent since 2009, thanks in part to increased use of our cogeneration plant, which burns cleaner fuel, and the elimination of coke burning.

Imperial has also reduced fugitive benzene emissions by about 90 percent since 1994 at our Sarnia site. Fugitive emissions are small air emissions that are inherent to any production process. We use infrared imaging devices to monitor the plant for emissions, and we’ve developed processes to repair leaks without shutting down the manufacturing process. As a result, this reduction was achieved despite overall higher production at the Sarnia site.

The Ontario government’s fenceline monitoring program benefits the public and helps the company by establishing a consistent way to monitor safe operations at our fenceline. Learn more about fenceline monitoring and view Imperial’s monitoring data at iolfencelinemonitoring.ca.

Toxic Reductions Act (TRA)

Air pollution - discharge of sulphur dioxide

Petroleum Refining Industry Standard Summaries