Holcim permit

In June 2019, LaFargeHolcim (Holcim) submitted a permit amendment request to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) to allow the plant to:

• • Increase the maximum allowed output of carbon monoxide from about 4,300 tons per year to 7,100 tons per year

  • Increase their use of controversial petroleum (pet) coke rather than use more expensive, cleaner sources of fuel

Why? 

From what we gathered:

• • Technology exists to decrease emissions, but it's expensive. TCEQ asserts that the cost associated with Holcim actually using best available control technology is too prohibitive despite the plant's proximity to a growing number of families. Money over people.

  • Petroleum companies have an overabundance of the toxic waste product, pet coke, and many are paying cement companies to take it off their hands. We don't know what the arrangement is with Holcim, but pet coke is cheaper than cleaner fuels.

  • The limestone that Holcim utilizes is naturally higher in organic compounds than the limestone of the other cement plants in Midlothian, which has led to consistently less efficient combustion with higher release of CO, sulfur compounds and VOCs as compared to the other plants. This makes it harder for Holcim to decrease emissions, even when using similar technology to the other plants. See Comparison of plants.

Holcim permit application to TCEQ: Permit 8996, PSDTX454M5

Draft of air modeling for Holcim permit

As Midlothian residents, we were asked to accept the science endorsed by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). Why didn't we?

• In our interaction with TCEQ staff, they acknowledged they were not familiar with all technical aspects of the permit (i.e., air modeling, engineering aspects, best available control technology, in-depth knowledge of cement industry).

• In the early 2000s, when Holcim last asked to increase emissions, TCEQ withheld knowledge that better technology was available to reduce emissions. They also tried to protect Holcim from having to submit a New Source Review (NSR) permit.

• TCEQ repeatedly fails to forcefully enforce permit violations.

  • In 2018, there were 4,950 unauthorized air pollution events in Texas, resulting in double the unauthorized emissions over the previous year. However, only 57 penalties were issued. Over the past five years, TCEQ has issued similarly low rates of penalties.

  • When fines are issued, the dollar figure of the penalty is so low (well below what TCEQ is authorized to issue) that it is more profitable for companies to continue to violate their permits and pay the fines than correct the problem. In 2018, TCEQ fined companies just $0.013 per pound of unauthorized emissions.

That’s why we hired Dr. Ron Sahu