Philip L. Rinaldi
Alma materNew Jersey Institute of Technology
Occupation(s)Founder and Former President and CEO of Philadelphia Energy Solutions (2012-2017)
Founder and Former CEO of CVR

Philip Rinaldi is the founder and former CEO of Philadelphia Energy Solutions, the largest oil refinery located on the US East Coast, and the founder of Coffeyville Resources. In addition, he has been the CEO of Seminole Fertilizers, Mulberry Resources, National Zinc, and was a senior vice president for Tosco.[1] He is a serial entrepreneur in oil refining and started with fellow serial entrepreneur Thomas O'Malley[2] at Phibro in the 1980s.

Education and Early Career

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Rinaldi was raised in Belleville New Jersey. He earned his BS and MS in chemical engineering from New Jersey Institute of Technology in 1968 and 1976, respectively.[3]

His professional career started with Exxon where he left in 1980 to co-found Phibro Resources Corporation as an energy and natural resource development subsidiary of the Phibro-Salomon Brothers merchant bank.[3]

Mulberry & Piney Point

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In 1988, Rinaldi and his partners conducted a $260 million buyout of W.R. Grace's phosphate business based on Polk County, FL and named it Seminole Fertilizer.[4] Later, Rinaldi's Seminole merged with French investor Judas Azuelos's US fertilizer business which had purchased a 700-acre site known as the Piney Point phosphate plant on the south shore of Tampa Bay. Rinaldi became the President and CEO of Mulberry Phosphates, the new name for the merged entity.[4] In January 2001, after a string of poor financial results, and after giving warning to regulators, the company walked away from the site and declared bankruptcy in February 2001.[5]

A top state regulator called Piney Point "one of the biggest environmental threats in Florida history." State officials fear the waste will spill into Tampa Bay, killing millions of fish and destroying plant life for miles.[6]

Fertilizer plants like Piney Point produce large volumes of low-level radioactive waste due to the concentrating effect of natural radiation emitting radium found in the rocks that also contain phosphates. Radium will decay to radon, which is hazardous. This concentrated byproduct, which is enriched by a ratio of roughly 4-to-1[7] during the production of mono and diammonium phosphate fertilizers is called phosphogypsum (calcium sulfate) and has historically been used as a road bed material and as a concrete blending agent like fly-ash. However in 1989 the EPA banned these co-product uses of phosphogypsum.[8] To dispose of it, the phosphate industry stacks it into large mounds often covering hundreds of acres and sitting more than 100 feet tall.. Piney Point's two phosphogypsum stacks are 50 to 70 feet high.[9] Ongoing maintenance, primarily contact water treating and disposal, in addition to civil engineering management of the structure of the gypsum stack are required. The bankruptcy and walk-away by the management team of the gypsum stacks at Piney Point remain highly controversial.[10] In 2021, twenty years after Mulberry's bankruptcy, disaster struck with hundreds of millions of gallons of toxic effluent water leaking from the plant site into Tampa Bay causing a red-tide.[11] The state of Florida has quoted a spend of $185 million to manage the legacy of Mulberry's Piney Point site and intends to have it be fully closed by the end of 2024.[12] As of October 9, 2024, the EPA was still in the process of approving the final end-plan for the closure and redeployment of phosphogypsum from Mulberry's Piney Point facility.[13][14]

Coffeyville Resources

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In 2004, Rinaldi purchased the Farmland Industries' 118,000 bpd refinery and ammonia fertilizer chemical business located in Coffeyville, KS for $281 million. The sale was executed as a part of Farmland's bankruptcy auction process[15] and "cleared the way for the bankrupt company, once the largest farmer-owned cooperative in North America, to pay about 60,000 creditors."[16] Rinaldi paid $22 million in upfront cash, assumed $174 million in liabilities, and relied on Goldman Sachs to provide $85 to purchase working capital for the transaction.[16] Pegasus Capital backed Rinaldi and his management team.[17]

A year later in July 2005, Rinaldi was able to sell the Coffeyville business to an affiliate of Goldman Sachs for $700 million, creating a substantial return for his $22 million of leveraged investment.[18]

The refinery is known as the CVR Coffeyville Refinery today and is still in operation and is majority owned (66%) by Carl Icahn.[19]

Philadelphia Energy Solutions "PES"

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In 2012, Rinaldi led a buyout of the troubled 355,000 bpd Sunoco Philadelphia refinery spread across 1300 acres[20] with The Carlyle Group as its financial backer although Rinaldi was the largest private shareholder with a stake in excess of $24 million according to PES's S-1 Registration Statement..[21] The refinery was purchased for a near-zero price.[22] Rinaldi turned the fortunes of the refinery around over the next four years and initiated a program to use the refinery as the anchor for a larger energy park in southern Philadelphia and to take the company and its logistics division public via an initial public offering in 2014 and 2015 respectively.[23] The $1.3 billion IPO effort was suspended in later in 2016[24] “given the market environment, with both very low refining profitability coupled with tight Bakken spreads, it was going to be a hard story to sell to investors. I don’t think that’s a surprise,” said Matthew Blair, an equity research analyst at Tudor, Pickering & Holt. In 2015, PES had postponed an initial public offering in August 2015 after investors balked at the price per share.[25]

In his role as the CEO of the largest east-coast refinery, Rinaldi became one of the most vocal critics of the USA's Renewable Fuels Standard program.[26] He stated that independent refiners like PES do not have the ability to cross-subsidize their operations in light of the RFS as compared to integrated refiners Like Valero.[27] He fought against the Obama Administration's end the domestic crude oil export ban for US crude oil production in 2015.[28] In addition, Rinaldi became a major proponent of developing LNG exports from Philadelphia by using the PES asset as the central asset of a major energy complex.[29]

The long-term effects of poor maintenance and lack of reinvestment led to a series of damaging fires[30] including the 2019 Philadelphia Refinery Explosion, and ultimately closed the refinery in 2019 and led to the bankruptcy and dissolution of PES.[31] Its bankruptcy was challenged in the courts for more than year with the community leadership of Philadelphia becoming involved with an estimated $16 billion of economic impact at stake.[32]

Rinaldi formed a competing company in 2019 to purchase the PES estate from bankruptcy with the intent of restarting the refinery and also building a renewable fuels business in Philadelphia.[33] The attempted restart of the PES Refinery by Rinaldi was deeply contested with environmentalists and employees being on opposite sides of the issue:

Joe Minott, executive director of Philadelphia Clean Air Council, said he doesn’t trust Rinaldi’s new green intentions. "I don’t think Mr. Rinaldi has any idea what going green means, what clean energy means, and I would not trust that he would really move forward with something that was acceptable to the community and would benefit the environment in the Philadelphia area,” Minott said. “Phil Rinaldi would be a terrible choice to do anything with the old refinery,” he added. “While he was a head of PES, I think he essentially destroyed the company and created the mess that it is today.”[34] Ryan O’Callaghan, president of United Steelworkers Local 10-1, which represented union workers at the refinery, said he had many conversations with Rinaldi and thinks his proposal is very promising. “We’re familiar with Phil, he’s a good man. He had a vision last time [when he created PES], and it seems like he has a vision this time,” O’Callaghan said.[35]

Ultimately, a federal judge approved a $252 million bid from Hilco Redevelopment Partners to demolish the 1300 acre site in 2020 even though Rinaldi's bid was $25 million higher in value.[32]

Other Activities and Awards

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Rinaldi served as the Chairman of the Board of Trustees for his alma mater the New Jersey Institute of Technology.[36] He was selected for the 2019 NJIT Alumni Achievement Award.[37] He is a founding director of the NJIT Alumni Association and has endowed the Louis and Marie Carmella Rinaldi Scholarship in honor of his parents.[38]

Rinaldi has also been a member of the Board of Directors at United Way of Greater Philadelphia & Southern New Jersey and a member of the Board of Directors of the National Italian American Foundation.[39]

References

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  1. ^ "Philadelphia Energy Solutions Inc.- Form S-1". sec.gov.
  2. ^ "O'Malley, Thomas D. 1942– | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com.
  3. ^ a b "Philip Rinaldi - Profile". Interdependence.org.
  4. ^ a b Trigaux, Robert (2005). "Executives turn their backs on the Piney Point disaster". Tampa Bay Times.
  5. ^ "From the Archives: Bending the rules at Piney Point, a $140-million mess". Tampa Bay Times. 2003.
  6. ^ Times, CRAIG PITTMAN, JULIE HAUSERMAN & CANDACE RONDEAUX St Petersburg. "No Quick Fix for Piney Point Plight". The Ledger. Retrieved 2024-10-28.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  7. ^ "Chemical Processing of Phosphate". fipr.floridapoly.edu. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  8. ^ "Phosphogypsum and the EPA Ban". fipr.floridapoly.edu. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  9. ^ Times, CRAIG PITTMAN, JULIE HAUSERMAN & CANDACE RONDEAUX St Petersburg. "No Quick Fix for Piney Point Plight". The Ledger. Retrieved 2024-10-28.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  10. ^ "First pond atop the troubled Piney Point gypsum stack is closed". WUSF. 2023-09-21. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  11. ^ Cohen, Li (2022). "Contaminated water from Florida mining facility dumped a year's worth of hazardous nutrients into Tampa Bay in just 10 days, study shows". CBS News.
  12. ^ "First pond atop the troubled Piney Point gypsum stack is closed". WUSF. 2023-09-21. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  13. ^ US EPA, OAR (2023-09-06). "Phosphogypsum". www.epa.gov. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  14. ^ "Notice of Pending Approval for Other Use of Phosphogypsum". Federal Register. 2024-10-09. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
  15. ^ "In re Farmland Industries, Inc". casetext - Thomson Reuters.
  16. ^ a b "Farmland sells Coffeyville plant, the last of its big assets". Associated Press. 2004.
  17. ^ "Farmland will sell Coffeyville plant for $281M". The Business Journal.
  18. ^ "Ex-Farmland unit sells for $700M". Kansas City Business Journal.
  19. ^ Linnane, Ciara (2024). "Icahn Enterprises' stock slides 14% as majority-owned CVR Energy suspends its dividend". MarketWatch.
  20. ^ "Former refinery CEO Rinaldi says he wants to make renewable fuels at the complex". WHYY. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  21. ^ "Philadelphia Energy Solutions Inc. Form S-1". www.sec.gov. Retrieved 2024-10-30.
  22. ^ "Carlyle Bets Big on U.S. Energy". The Wall Street Journal. 2012.
  23. ^ "Carlyle-backed PES Logistics Partners files for IPO". Reuters. 2014.
  24. ^ Renshaw, Jarrett (2016). "Philadelphia Energy Solutions ends bid to go public". Reuters.
  25. ^ Renshaw, Jarrett (2016). "Philadelphia Energy Solutions ends bid to go public". Reuters.
  26. ^ "Refiner Cuts Costs, Offers Buyouts as Ethanol Credits Rise". Bloomberg.com. 2016-09-08. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  27. ^ Renshaw, Jarrett (2016). "U.S. refiners revamp operations as renewable fuel costs surge". Reuters.
  28. ^ "Free America's Energy Future: Drop Washington's Counterproductive Oil and Natural Gas Export Ban". The Cato Institute. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  29. ^ www.bizjournals.com https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/morning_roundup/2015/02/q-a-with-phil-rinaldi-on-philadelphia-as-an-energy.html. Retrieved 2024-10-28. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  30. ^ "Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES) Refinery Fire and Explosions". US Chemical Safety Board. 2022.
  31. ^ Renshaw, Jarrett. "Philadelphia Energy Solutions files for bankruptcy after refinery fire". Rueters.
  32. ^ a b "Bankruptcy judge approves Philadelphia Energy Solutions' sale to a developer that has no plans to re-start a refinery". StateImpact Pennsylvania. 2020-02-13. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  33. ^ "Former refinery CEO Rinaldi says he wants to make renewable fuels at the complex". WHYY. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  34. ^ "Former refinery CEO Rinaldi says he wants to make renewable fuels at the complex". WHYY. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  35. ^ "Former refinery CEO Rinaldi says he wants to make renewable fuels at the complex". WHYY. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  36. ^ Messenger-Gazette, The (2011-02-03). "Bridgwater resident elected chairman of the NJIT Board of Overseers". nj. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  37. ^ "Bridgewater Resident to Receive 2019 NJIT Alumni Award". Patch.com. 2019.
  38. ^ Messenger-Gazette, The (2011-02-03). "Bridgwater resident elected chairman of the NJIT Board of Overseers". nj. Retrieved 2024-10-28.
  39. ^ "Philip L. Rinaldi: Positions, Relations and Network - MarketScreener". in.marketscreener.com. Retrieved 2024-11-08.