According to local media reports, four environmental organizations announced they intend to sue the Allegheny Ludlum steel mill in Brackenridge, Pennsylvania for violating the federal Clean Air Act by releasing far more pollution than a permit for the plant allows.
The organizations involved in the suit include the Group Against Smog and Pollution (GASP), PennEnvironment, the Environmental Integrity Project and the Clean Air Council. The Clean Air Act allows concerned citizens to sue polluters when government regulators refuse, or do not have the resources, to enforce the law.
According to the groups’ complaint, the steel plant has exceeded legal limits from a 2002 permit for nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, particulate matter (or soot), and carbon monoxide since installing a new pair of electric arc furnaces in 2003 and 2004.
In 2016, the Allegheny County Health Department issued a new draft permit, favorable to Allegheny, that would significantly raise the allowable levels of pollution. The coalition of environmental organizations objected to the permit, leading to the current lawsuit that aims to force the company to come into compliance with the permit, either by installing up-to-date equipment or by improving operations to reduce pollution.
“Allegheny Ludlum has been breaking air pollution laws for 15 years, and we've all been breathing their illegal emissions,” said Rachel Filippini, Executive Director of GASP. “Our region is already struggling to attain National Ambient Air Quality Standards, so there should be no tolerance for companies that play loose with the laws and with our health.”
Joseph Otis Minott, Executive Director of the Clean Air Council, said: “Longstanding noncompliance with air emissions limitations is unacceptable as a matter of law and policy. The facility has imposed an unnecessary health burden on a county already suffering from considerable air pollution problems.”
"Clean air is a right, not a privilege," added PennEnvironment's Pittsburgh organizer Stephen Riccardi.