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If you've watched the news from southeastern North Carolina in the past year, perhaps you've wondered what the fuss was over a proposed plant Carolina Cement proposes to build and operate on the banks of the Northeast Cape Fear River near Castle Hayne. It appears to be a classic dispute between those who want the jobs the plant would provide and those who fear the air emissions, including mercury, would violate air quality standards and threaten the health of area residents.
Titan America and its subsidiary have been insistent on one point: Whatever the air emissions standards are, the plant will comply with them. That's a responsible stance.
Many local residents, environmentalists and health advocates, including more than 200 doctors, worry over a set of circumstances that seems to suggest that state and local governments are moving too quickly on the project. The state, which is providing $300,000 to bring the plant to the site of an old cement facility, and New Hanover County, which is providing $4.2 million, see no reason to delay.
The state recently issued a draft air pollution permit for the plant, prompting opponents to question why the rush. And they wonder why the state did not recognize that the project should be subject to the N.C. Environmental Policy Act, which appears to require an environmental assessment for any project that affects the environment, requires permits and in which public money is involved.
The company says it needs the plant to keep up with regional demands for cement and will eventually employ 160 workers at its 1,900-acre facility, which would be fourth largest cement plant in the country. Environmentalists point to the 600 acres of wetlands the plant could affect and more than 8,000 tons of air emissions the plant could put out, including airborne mercury emissions in an area where water is already tainted by mercury. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently wrote the company that the limit under the draft permit is higher than the maximum standards the EPA proposed in May.
The state has put the cart ahead of the horse, issuing a draft permit based on one set of standards when the EPA is about to impose stricter standards. The perplexing haste to permit this plant raises questions about whether state regulators are more interested in creating jobs than safeguarding air and water quality.
