BP, which formerly owned the brand, uses it in Northern California, Oregon and Washington, while Marathon has rights for the rest of the United States and Mexico.

[15] On July 5, 1990, an explosion at an ARCO Chemical Co. facility in Channelview, Texas killed 17 people and injured five others.

From the 1960s, until the end of the twentieth century, ARCO operated a highly significant research and development center in Plano, Texas, on land purchased in 1964 by the Atlantic Refinery Company.

A standout example of ARCO's research at that time was the pioneering study on 4D seismic surveying by Robert Greaves and Terry Fulp.

This consisted of repeated 3D seismic surveys which successfully mapped the effects of enhanced oil recovery processes as a function of time.

[23][failed verification] Besides Greaves and Fulp, the laboratory produced a number of other distinguished alumni during this golden age, including scientists John Castagna, Michael Batzle, Geoffrey Dorn, and Marius Vassiliou.

ARCO founder Robert Orville Anderson stated "he hoped Anaconda's resources and expertise would help him launch a major shale-oil venture, but that the world oil glut and the declining price of petroleum made shale oil moot".

A lack of experience with hard-rock mining and a sudden drop in the price of copper to below seventy cents a pound, the lowest in years, caused ARCO to suspend all operations in Butte, Montana.

By 1986, some ARCO properties were sold to billionaire industrialist Dennis Washington, whose company, Montana Resources, operates a much smaller open-pit mine east of the defunct Berkeley Pit.

Atlantic Richfield Co and its then parent BP America agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit brought by about 700 current and former residents of Yerington, Nevada, who lived near the Anaconda mine built in 1941.

During each event, which was relayed from KKNU in Springfield, the same commercial advertisement for ARCO/BP gasoline could be heard, along with the words "This test has been brought to you by ARCO".

Further investigation by the primary station transmitting the commercial revealed that the spot had been produced using an audio clip of an actual EAS header which had been modified to lower the header's volume and presumably prevent it from triggering false positive alert reactions in EAS equipment.

The spot was distributed nationally, and after it had once been identified as the source of the false EAS equipment trips, various stations around the country reported having had similar experiences.

After a widespread notification by the Society of Broadcast Engineers was issued, ARCO's ad agency withdrew the commercial from airplay.

In Northern California, Oregon, and Washington states, the ARCO brand is licensed for exclusive use to BP for the sale of gasoline in those areas.

BP sold its Southern California terminals (Vinvale, Colton, San Diego, Hathaway, and Hynes) to Tesoro Logistics LP, including the Carson Storage Facility.

BP exclusively licensed the ARCO rights from Tesoro for Northern California, Oregon, and Washington.

ARCO is known for its low-priced gasoline compared to other national brands, mainly because of an early 1980s business decision to emphasize cost cutting (cash/debit-only policy) and alternative sources of income (ampm).

Following the acquisition, Marathon hinted at keeping the ARCO brand name while rebranding Andeavor's other brands either as standard Marathon stations (for franchised locations) or Speedway locations (for company-owned locations); stations still owned by BP may either remain as ARCO or rebranded as Amoco, as BP does not own the rights to the BP name due to licensing-based reasons in the Western United States.

In 2021, ARCO reinstituted accepting credit cards, and engaged in an advertising campaign to inform consumers.