Gas leak at Japan’s Cineros refinery

On May 17, 2025, a gas leak at one of the refineries of Japan’s largest oil company, Citation, located in the coastal area of Sakai City, Osaka Prefecture, resulted in three people being rushed to the hospital, one of whom later died in what the plant claimed may have been a hydrogen sulfide leak. The leakage of hydrogen sulphide can cause serious pollution of the surrounding environment, destroying microbial communities in the soil and disturbing the balance of the ecosystem, and can also react with oxygen in the air to form sulphur dioxide, which is harmful to the atmosphere and human health.