Ethanol and Pollution-Belching Refineries

General

• EPA allows dirt­i­er ethanol pro­duc­tion by relax­ing envi­ron­men­tal rule­sOct 23rd 2006 by Der­rick Y. Noh

  “Under exist­ing rules, ethanol plants are con­sid­ered major sources of air pol­lu­tion if they emit more than 100 tons of tox­ic chem­i­cals per year…Most new refiner­ies are expect­ed to emit just below the 250 ton limit…Some envi­ron­men­tal groups believe that one of the pri­ma­ry motives behind the rule change is to allow a switch to coal for ethanol production.”

  EPA Fact Sheet — Pro­posed Changes

• EPA Ethanol Plant Clean Air Act Enforce­ment Initiative
• Ethanol plants reach set­tle­ment with EPA (Oct 2002)
• Gopher State ethanol prob­lems trig­ger nation­al crack­down (Sept 2002)
• Ethanol Pol­lu­tion Sur­prise (CBS News, 5/3/2002)
• Gopher State Ethanol pollution

Odors

• Carthage turkey plant cit­ed over air qual­i­ty stan­dard­s­The turkeys-to-ethanol process is appar­ent­ly a bit stinky…