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10 hours ago
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The EPA plans to require the nation’s municipal waste incinerators to monitor for dangerous air emissions, a move environmental groups have hailed as a major step toward reining in a staggering source of localized toxic air pollution that most frequently hits low-income neighborhoods.
Municipal incinerators’ stacks often spew hazardous pollutants like dioxins, particulate matter, PFAS, carbon monoxide, acid gases, or nitrogen oxides. The substances are linked to cancer, developmental disorders and other serious diseases, but still are burned with limited or patchwork oversight.
The new rule would require about 60 such facilities across the country to consider about 800 chemicals that are part of the federal toxic releases inventory. The data could be used to inform local residents about what’s being emitted, litigate, alert first responders, increase monitoring, or inform state and federal regulators on how to set new pollution limits.
The EPA is “doing the right thing”, said Mike Ewall, executive director of the Energy Justice Network public health advocacy group. It co-led a citizens’ rulemaking petition signed by 300 environmental groups requesting the EPA take the step.
“This industry is worse than landfilling, dirtier than coal burning, and disproportionately impacts people of color,” Ewall added.
Municipal incinerators burn residential and commercial garbage as an alternative to landfilling. They are often prolific polluters and, public health groups say, under-regulated. The waste streams are filled with consumer goods and materials that contain PFAS that are not destroyed in the incineration process, or PVC that forms dioxins when burned.
The controversial facilities have been at the center of numerous public health battles. In Detroit, a citizen lawsuit under the US Clean Air Act shut down the then-largest municipal incinerator, which for decades spewed high levels of carbon monoxide in a low income neighborhood near the city’s downtown.
Despite the toxic emissions, incinerators often position themselves as “green” businesses to receive subsidies for producing energy. The new reporting requirements “will help disprove the claims”, said Tim Whitehouse, executive director of the public health advocacy group Peer, and a former EPA enforcement attorney.
“A lot of people behind the scenes are applauding this because they know incinerators are greenwashing themselves as a clean energy source,” he added.
The EPA did reject a portion of the petition that asked the EPA to monitor medical waste incineration and sewage sludge incineration at wastewater treatment facilities. Incineration of sewage sludge, a byproduct of the wastewater treatment process, is especially a problem because it is virtually always laden with PFAS. The agency said it does not have the staffing to monitor those, but left the door open to do it later.
The EPA made the decision after receiving the rule-making petition led by Peer and the Environmental Justice Network. The agency rarely acts on such citizen petitions, but Whitehouse said the decision follows a previous EPA proposal to require monitoring.
The proposal was never implemented, but the Biden EPA has reinvigorated the TRI, Whitehouse said. Environmental groups are “expecting fierce industry pushback” he added, and the measure’s proposal is uncertain with Trump taking over the EPA. But the EPA would be open to litigation if it does not implement the rules, Whitehouse said.
“I’m not holding high hopes the Trump administration will rush to do this but we will hold its feet to the fire,” he added.
