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Burning Rubber: Texas
Industries and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality Move Toward
Making Emission
Reductions By Burning Tires?
Skeptical? So Are We.
Dallas, TX
(Tuesday, October 15, 2002)-On
October 23, 2002 the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ),
formerly the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission (TNRCC), is
expected to propose a rule change that will impact the Dallas/Fort Worth
clean air plan. As you may recall the cement industry and more specifically
Texas Industries (TXI) and Cemex sued the state environmental agency
challenging the 30% emission reduction mandated by the DFW SIP.
The proposed
settlement issued from the TCEQ indicates that tire fires in cement kilns
will help the region reach clean air goals. Skeptical? So are we.
When the
settlement is reached, TXI’s Midlothian
plant will be the second cement kiln in the nation to burn both hazardous
waste and tires simultaneously. The health impacts are yet to be determined
but it should be noted that TXI is currently the largest industrial smog
contributor in North Texas
as well as the largest emitter of toxic releases.
The technology
that TXI plans to utilize is similar to a cannon that will hurl 4 to 5 tires
per minute 230 feet into the kiln. A company memo attached to the
settlement likens the device to a “Gunnax pneumatic gun developed by F.L.
Smith and Co.” Guns and tires an unlikely connection.
The cannons
will shoot tires into the residues of the hazardous wastes it uses as
“fuel.” Although not officially classified as a hazardous waste, tires have
zinc, butadiene and other hazardous components.
Other concerns with the settlement agreement
include:
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Switching to an annual
rolling average of NOx emissions instead of thirty days. This allows for
pollution spikes and is generally used as a switch and bate technique to
increase emissions.
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Rewriting the
definition of “low NOx burner” and “mid-kiln firing” to allow TXI to use
the one-of-a-kind, untested, mid-kiln process.
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Giving Cemex and TXI up
to $2 million from the state to subsidize the start-up of tire burning at
their plants.
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Making no promises for
reductions or performance for TXI’s new tire burning process.
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And possibly allowing
for the trading of emissions from one plant to another. This would allow
for the plant to buy NOx “credits” from another business without actually
making the reductions themselves.
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