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Major Victory for Refinery Communities: EIP Praises EPA for Withdrawal of Flawed Refinery Risk Rule
Oct 21, 2009

Local officials and the Sierra Club in Texas joined the nonprofit Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) today in supporting actions taken by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to withdraw a January 2009 determination that stricter, risk-based standards for petroleum refineries are not necessary. 

The Bush Administration had proposed to stop regulating hazardous air emissions from refineries on the grounds that current emission levels posed no real risk to human health.  EIP and other groups called for EPA to reverse the decision because it was based on a gross underestimate of emissions.  For example, new remote sensing technologies that directly measure air emissions show that refinery releases of toxic air pollutants can be as much as 100 times higher than EPA predicts. 

• For the press release, click here
• For a copy of the proposed withdrawal of the refinery risk assessment, click here