DALLAS—Dow has reached a deal with U.S. authorities that will eliminate large amounts of air pollution from four of its Gulf Coast petrochemical manufacturing facilities. The settlement is with the federal Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Justice, and also the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.
The settlement resolves allegations that Dow and two subsidiaries, Performance Materials and Union Carbide, violated the Clean Air Act by failing to operate and monitor industrial flares correctly at the facilities. Infractions include oversteaming the flares, and failing to ensure that VOCs and other pollutants were efficiently combusted.
The company will spend nearly $300 million on the installation and operation of technology to reduce flaring at 26 flares across the four sites. It also will pay $3 million in civil penalties.
Two of the facilities are in Texas, at Freeport and Orange. The other two are in Hahnville and Plaquemine, La.