CHEMICAL EXPLOSIONSTrump Quietly Shutters the Only Federal Agency that Investigates Industrial Chemical Explosions
Hazardous chemical accidents happen in the U.S. about every other day. Who will investigate them now?
On a summer night in 2023, an explosion at one of Louisiana’s biggest petrochemical complexes sent a plume of fire into the sky. More explosions followed as poison gas spewed from damaged tanks at the Dow chemical plant, triggering a shelter-in-place order for anyone within a half mile of the facility, which sprawls across more than 830 acres near Baton Rouge.
For more than a year, a little-known government agency has been investigating the incident. But the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board will likely shut down before completing its probes of the Dow explosion and other such incidents across the country. President Donald Trump’s administration has quietly proposed shutting down the board, an independent federal agency charged with uncovering the causes of large-scale chemical accidents.
Near the end of a 1,224-page budget document released with little fanfare on May 30, White House officials said shutting down the agency, commonly called the CSB, will help “move the nation toward fiscal responsibility” as the Trump administration works to “redefine the proper role of the federal government.” The CSB’s $14 million annual budget would be zeroed out for the 2026 fiscal year and its emergency fund of $844,000 would be earmarked for closure-related costs. The process of shutting the agency down is set to begin this year, according to CSB documents.
Eliminating the CSB will come at a cost to the safety of plant workers and neighboring communities, especially along the Gulf Coast, where the bulk of the U.S. petrochemical industry is concentrated, said former CSB officials and environmental groups.
“Closing the CSB will mean more accidents at chemical plants, more explosions and more deaths,” said Beth Rosenberg, a public health expert who served on the CSB board from 2013 to 2014.
“This shows that the Trump administration does not care about frontline communities already burdened with this industry,” said Roishetta Ozane, founder of the Vessel Project, an environmental justice group in Lake Charles. “We’re the ones who have to shelter in place or evacuate whenever there’s an explosion or [chemical] release, and now there will be less oversight when these things happen.”
The CSB did not respond to a request for comment.
The proposed closure of the CSB follows several other moves by the Trump administration to slash staffing levels at the Environmental Protection Agency and ease federal health and safety regulations.
Founded in 1998, the CSB investigates the causes of petrochemical accidents and issues recommendations to
