Downturn forces insulation maker to repeal request
Permit would allow more emissions
By Lee Shearer | lee.shearer@onlineathens.com |
An insulation manufacturer has withdrawn its once-controversial request for a permit to increase emissions from its Athens plant because it no longer plans to expand operations here.
CertainTeed Corp. applied for the permit more than four years ago as company executives considered expanding the Athena Drive fiberglass insulation factory during a national housing boom.
But with the construction industry reeling in one of the country's worst economic downturns in decades, demand for insulation has dropped.
Citing lower demand, CertainTeed officials have laid off nearly 10 percent of the plant's 234 employees since December.
Four years ago, however, CertainTeed executives were considering an expansion that would employ 119 new workers at an average wage of $37,000 per year and add $1.4 million per year in taxes to local government coffers.
Athens environmental activists hotly opposed the plan, however, because of the additional pollution CertainTeed's ramped-up production would produce.
Emissions of formaldehyde, a probable carcinogen, would rise from about 19 tons a year to nearly 50 tons a year, according to documents the company submitted to the state Environmental Protection Division, while particle-matter pollution would increase annually by nearly 100 tons.
Although most air pollution generated in Athens comes from our vehicles, CertainTeed is the largest single industrial polluter, according to EPD statistics.
EPD officials said in 2006 the agency likely would approve an emissions permit.
"The withdrawal of their expansion permit is an indicator of economic hard times for CertainTeed," said Jill McElheney of the Northeast Georgia Environmental Health Coalition, calling the company's decision a "celebratory moment for children's environmental health."
-- Originally published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Saturday, March 07, 2009
ARCHIVES
Expert Comments on CertainTeed Permit [pdf] - Sixteen pages of expert comments on the draft permit for CertainTeed by GA Center for Law in the Public Interest in Atlanta. Bottom line: the expansion permit is seriously flawed. March 2006.
Dirty Air is Bad for Business [pdf] By Beth Allgood, Southern Environmental Law Center, Atlanta
Overview
- Top Reasons for “No Net Increase” [pdf]
- CertainTeed’s Toxic Air Releases [pdf]
- How Much Increased Air Pollution? [pdf]
Industrial Development Authority (IDA)
- Diversity needed on development board [offsite]
- Athens Banner-Herald Forum, Nov 27, 2005
- CAA Press Release, [pdf] Nov 7, 2005
- CleanAirAthens.org Calls for Industrial Development Authority to Revisit CertainTeed Bond
- CAA Letter to IDA, [pdf] Nov 3, 2005
- CleanAirAthens.org request to IDA to revisit the Inducement Resolution.
- Questions from local CPA re IDA, [pdf] Oct 22, 2005
- Questions for IDA concerning legal, accounting and transparency issues.
Subsidy -- Bad for Business
- Tax Subsidy For Pollution [pdf]
- The Bucket Analogy: Bad for Growth [pdf]
- CertainTeed Expansion Could Hurt Local Farms [pdf]
- Mayor Davison's Reasons FOR Giving a Tax Subsidy [pdf]
- A-C Can Stop Certainteed's Expansion [pdf]
Health Facts
- Formaldehyde & Fiberglass [pdf's]
Solution: Expand with No Net Increase
Miscellaneous
- Letters: Peter Gess, Jill McElheney, Dave Oldaker [pdf's]
- Questions for EPD about CertainTeed [pdf]
- Background – News articles [offsite]
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