WASHINGTON — More than 200 chemical plants across the country will be required to reduce toxic emissions that are likely to cause cancer, under a new rule issued Tuesday by the Environmental Protection Agency. The rule advances President Joe Biden’s commitment to environmental justice by providing critical health protections to communities burdened by industrial pollution from ethylene oxide, chloroprene and other hazardous chemicals, officials said.
Areas that will benefit from the new rule include the predominantly Black neighborhoods outside New Orleans that EPA Administrator Michael Regan visited as part of his 2021 Journey to Justice tour. The rule will reduce emissions of chloroprene and other harmful pollutants in the Denka Performance Elastomer plant in LaPlace, Louisiana, the largest source of chloroprene emissions in the country, Regan said.
“Every community in this country deserves to breathe clean air. That’s why I took the Journey to Justice tour to communities like St. John the Baptist Parish, where residents have been bearing the brunt of toxic air for far too long,” Regan said. “We pledged to listen to people suffering from pollution and take action to protect them. Today we are delivering on that promise with stringent end standards to reduce pollution, reduce the risk of cancer and provide cleaner air for nearby communities.”
Combined with a rule issued last month to reduce ethylene oxide emissions from commercial sterilizers used to clean medical equipment, the new rule will reduce ethylene oxide and chloroprene emissions by nearly 80%, officials said.
The rule will apply to 218 facilities across Texas and Louisiana, the Ohio River Valley, West Virginia and the upper South, the EPA said. The action updates several regulations on chemical plant emissions that have not been tightened in nearly two decades.
Democratic Rep. Troy Carter, whose Louisiana district includes the Denka plant, called the new rule “a monumental step” to protect public health and the environment.
“Communities deserve to be safe. I’ve said this all along,” Carter told reporters at a briefing Monday. “It has to start with good regulations. It must start by listening to the people affected in the neighborhoods who have undoubtedly suffered the costs of being close to chemical plants – but not just chemical plants, chemical plants that don’t. Follow the rules.”
Carter said it is “critical that measures like these are demonstrated to maintain the trust of the American people.”
The new rule will reduce more than 6,200 metric tons (5,624 metric tons) of toxic air pollutants annually and implement fenceline monitoring, the EPA said, addressing health risks in surrounding communities and promoting environmental justice in Louisiana and other states.
The Justice Department sued Denka last year for releasing unsafe levels of chloroprene near homes and schools. Federal regulators had determined in 2016 that chloroprene emissions from the Denka plant contributed to the highest cancer risk of anywhere in the United States.
Denka, a Japanese company that bought the former DuPont rubber plant in 2015, said it “strongly opposes” the EPA’s latest action.
“EPA’s rulemaking is yet another attempt to drive a policy agenda that is not supported by law or science,” Denka said in a statement, adding that the agency has asserted that its facility “represents a danger to the community, despite the facility meeting its federal and state air permit requirements.”
The Denka plant, which makes synthetic rubber, has been at the center of protests over pollution in predominantly Black communities and the EPA’s efforts to reduce chloroprene emissions, particularly in the Mississippi River Chemical Corridor, an 85-mile industrial region. informally known as Cancer Alley. Denka said it has already invested more than $35 million to reduce chloroprene emissions.
The EPA, under pressure from local activists, agreed to open a civil rights investigation into the plant to determine whether state officials put black residents at increased risk for cancer. But in June, the EPA halted its investigation without releasing any official findings and without any commitment from the state to change its practices.
Regan said the rule issued Tuesday was separate from the civil rights investigation. He called the rule “very ambitious” and added that officials were making sure “that we protect all of these communities, not just those in Cancer Alley, but communities in Texas and Puerto Rico and other areas that are threatened by these dangerous air currents.” toxic pollutants. ”
While the rule focuses on toxic emissions, “by its very nature, this rule protects environmental justice communities — Black and brown communities, low-income communities — that have suffered for far too long,” Regan said.
Patrice Simms, vice president of the environmental law firm Earthjustice, called the rule “a victory in our pursuit of environmental justice.”
“There is always more to be done to demand that our laws meet their full potential,” said Simms, “but the EPA’s action today takes us one meaningful step closer to realizing the promise of clean air, the promise of safe and livable communities and…..fairer and more equitable environmental protection.”
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Associated Press writer Michael Phillis in St. Louis contributed to this story.