One of The Environmental Integrity Project’s top priorities is to hold corporate polluters accountable when they break the law to ensure our environmental laws work for those who most need their protection.
Our attorneys work with our research and engineering teams to provide pro-bono legal representation to local organizations fighting back against illegal pollution and holding government agencies accountable for protecting public health. We take companies to court if they don’t comply with bedrock environmental laws, like the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act. And we sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and state environmental agencies if they don’t follow the law and do their jobs to protect the public.
Our work is even more crucial as the Trump Administration signals it is not serious about environmental enforcement – especially in communities who suffer the most from industrial pollution — and slashes EPA’s workforce and budget. Many state environmental agencies will lack the resources or political will—or both—to fill in the enforcement gap left behind; it has never been more important for EIP to provide the legal and technical resources that local organizations need to fight polluting companies and protect the health and wellbeing of their communities.
EIP is not afraid to take on powerful industries who violate clean air and clean water laws, including refineries, chemical and gas processing plants, coal plants, paper mills, and large wastewater utilities.
Active Enforcement Cases
Louisiana Petcoke Plants’ Toxic Discharges
EIP is suing two Louisiana petroleum coke processing plants for discharging toxic water pollution including lead, mercury, vanadium, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and for failing to tell state regulators about the contaminants in their stormwater.
EIP, Healthy Gulf, and Micah 6:8 Mission filed two separate lawsuits against the petroleum coke processing plants, which take a byproduct of oil refining and superheat it to produce a black, carbon-dense coal-like substance – “petcoke” – that is used in aluminum manufacturing and other industries.
The 13 petcoke processing plants across the U.S., seven of which are in Louisiana, were built between 1935 and 1983, lack modern air and water pollution controls, and are among the leading sources of air and water pollution in their regions.
Allies File Federal Lawsuits Against Petroleum Coke Plants in Louisiana for Toxic Water Pollution
Pennsylvania Shell Plastics Plant Air and Water Pollution
EIP is pursuing legal action against the Shell Monaca chemical plant in Beaver County, PA, in an effort to improve oversight and reduce water and air pollution from the $6 billion plant that opened in 2022 and transforms ethane, a product of natural gas hydrofracked in the region, into tiny plastic pellets.
In 2023, EIP and Clean Air Council filed a federal lawsuit against Shell for repeatedly violating permitted air pollution limits at the plant. The lawsuit called for strict penalties and a halt to the illegal release of smog-forming pollutants, including nitrogen oxide (NOx) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which also contribute to asthma attacks and lung disease.
In October 2024, EIP and our rallies in the region submitted a petition asking the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection to make changes to the water discharge permit for the Shell plant to improve oversight and reduce water pollution. The requested changes include monthly testing and stricter discharge limits for dangerous chemicals including lead, arsenic, aluminum, zinc, and PFAS; more frequent stormwater inspections to help prevent harmful chemicals from migrating undetected into waterways; and a solid plan to clean up polluted groundwater already existing on the site.
Groups File Federal Lawsuit Against Shell Plastics Plant in PA for Air Pollution Violations
Groups Petition Pennsylvania to Reduce Water Pollution from Shell Chemical Plant
Texas Plastics Plant’s Clean Water Violations
San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper, represented by the Environmental Integrity Project and Earthjustice, announced its intent to file a federal Clean Water Act enforcement suit against Dow Hydrocarbons, Union Carbide Corporation, and Braskem America for the ongoing discharge of microplastics (nurdles) and other unpermitted pollutants into the waterways surrounding their Seadrift, Texas, plastic manufacturing facility.
Nurdles and other microplastics do not dissolve or disappear over time; they remain present in downstream waters, impacting sealife, marine birds, and even potentially human health. The accumulation of this non-biodegradable pollution in the marine environment harms aquatic species and can contaminate fish, oysters, and shrimp with chemicals at levels unhealthy for human consumption.
Texas Waterkeeper Issues Notice of Intent to Sue for Illegal Water Pollution at Texas Plastics Plant
Pennsylvania Food Company’s Clean Water Violations
EIP, on behalf of the Lower Susquehanna Riverkeeper Association, filed a Notice of Intent to Sue the Hanover Foods facility in York County, PA, an hour south of Harrisburg, for significant and ongoing violations of federal and state clean water laws. The food processing plant routinely and illegally discharges pollutants into waterways and fails to comply with pollution monitoring and reporting requirements, in violation of both the federal Clean Water Act and Pennsylvania’s Clean Streams Law, as well as its clean water permits.
The facility, which makes canned, glass-packed, and frozen vegetables goods, produces up to 450,000 gallons per day of industrial wastewater that is treated at an on-site wastewater treatment plant before being sent to Penn Township’s municipal wastewater treatment plant. Any additional wastewater is further treated onsite and discharged into nearby Oil Creek.
Environmental Groups Take Legal Action Against PA Food Company for Clean Water Violations
In addition to taking companies who violate the law to court, EIP also produces in-depth reports about trends in environmental law enforcement to explain to decisionmakers why environmental enforcement programs are necessary to protect public health and the environment, and where federal and state agencies may be falling short.
In 2025, EIP requested and published EPA enforcement records to better understand what’s at stake when EPA fails to hold polluters accountable.
EIP’s December 2024 analysis found that neighborhoods of color and low-income communities that already suffer from the most pollution would likely be hardest hit by the Trump Administration’s drop in enforcement of pollution control laws.
Our 2023 report, “Polluter’s Playbook,” documented the systemic failure of Texas’ state environmental agency to force chronic offenders to take corrective action to avoid pollution violations in the future.
In 2019, our report, “The Thin Green Line,” found that during a decade of cuts at EPA from 2008 to 2018, 40 states also cut the staffing at their own environmental agencies. This provided evidence that simply shifting responsibility for enforcement from the federal to the state level will not work.
