We’re fighting air pollution and the climate impact
of the oil, gas, petrochemical, and other industries.
The same industrial sectors responsible for planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions also release large amounts of air pollutants that contribute to smog, lung and heart diseases, and cancer. Although the Clean Air Act was written to protect the public from these hazards, implementation and enforcement of the law often falls short.
We help keep the promises of the Clean Air Act by zeroing in on industrial sectors that disproportionately harm people of color, low-income families, and indigenous communities and which also present the greatest opportunities for cleanup. EIP is working to minimize air and climate pollution from new oil, gas, and petrochemical projects; clean up some of the dirtiest industrial operations through new rules, stronger permits, and targeted enforcement actions; and slash benzene and other air toxics from large industrial plants like refineries, chemical plants, and steel manufacturers.
Oil & Gas
The dramatic expansion of domestic oil and gas production sparked by the fracking boom over a decade ago has led to the rapid growth of U.S. petrochemical industries, including plastics production. This has caused an associated rise in toxic air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.
Coal
More than 200 coal-fired power plants across the U.S. account for around a fifth of the nation’s carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, as well as releases into the air of soot-like particles, mercury, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides that cause heart and asthma attacks, pollute waterways, and contaminate fish.
Steel
EIP created an interactive inventory to make it easier for the public and advocates to find environmental compliance information and permit records related to steel mills and related coke oven facilities, which have long been some of the dirtiest manufacturing sites in the US.
Wood Bioenergy
Over the last decade, a rapidly expanding but destructive industry has grown in the U.S. based on cutting down forests to convert the wood into pellets for burning in power plants, mostly in Europe. The industry promotes itself as a “climate friendly” alternative to burning coal. But in reality, the manufacture and burning of wood pellets creates large amounts of air pollution—frequently illegally—and destroys woodlands needed for wildlife habitat, water filtration, the production of oxygen, and the sequestration of carbon dioxide.
