Sierra Club Sues EPA Over Ottawa County Pollution

GRAND RAPIDS, MI - On Friday, Sierra Club filed a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) covering the omission of Ottawa County from the agency’s list of areas across the country found to be in nonattainment of EPA’s health-based ozone (smog pollution) standard.

Earlier this year, EPA designated a 7-county area in Southeast Michigan near Detroit as in nonattainment, as well as portions of several counties in Western Michigan (Muskegon, Allegan, Berrien). But it left out Ottawa County altogether even though Ottawa is the source of higher levels of ozone precursors (NOx and VOCs) than any of the other Western Michigan counties, and weather patterns and computer modeling show that Ottawa County's pollution -- including from Consumers Energy’s Campbell coal-fired power plant -- is contributing to the problems in nearby counties.

“It is getting harder to protect vulnerable communities in our most polluted areas in the state. The EPA cannot continue to turn a blind eye to causes of air and water pollution,” said Jordan Chrispell, Organizer with Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign in Western Michigan. “We will continue to push the Environmental Protection Agency to actually protect us from companies that contribute to and cause much of the pollution in our air and water. Here in Western Michigan, it does not get any more significant than Consumers’ Campbell coal-burning power plant in Ottawa County. The EPA needs to follow the Clean Air Act and recognize Ottawa County’s contribution to failing air quality in Western Michigan.”

The Clean Air Act is clear that any county with pollution contributing to monitored violations of the standard should be designated with a nonattainment classification. Once an area is designated nonattainment, it triggers an obligation for the state’s environmental agency to make a plan to address the area's pollution sources, and requires new sources of pollution to implement more effective emission controls.