Permit Revision Would Allow Severstal Dearborn to Release More Pollutants

A Dearborn steel plant that is considered one of the most notorious polluters in the Detroit metro area would be allowed to release hundreds of times more toxins under a permit revision proposed by Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality.

Severstal Dearborn, one of the largest steel manufacturers in the United States, would be allowed to release 725 times ore lead into the air from one portion of the plant under proposed changes to a 2006 emissions permit, the Detroit Free Press reports.

Releases of metal manganese hundreds of times the amount currently allowed are also part of the request. Carbon monoxide emissions would more than double, organic compound releases would see a sharp rise, and fine particulate matter dust would also increase.

Officials with the steelmaker and the DEQ said the proposed changes in the permit merely align the emissions occurring at the plant with the amount allowed in the permit, granted in 2006.

That permit was based on data that was “limited, incomplete and, as the current emissions test data have revealed, not as representative of Severstal’s operations as anticipated,” the DEQ stated in public documents seeking the revision.

>>>Read what's proposed.

One  resident who lives in the area of the plant told the Free Press she’s resigned to pollution being a fact of life in one of the state’s most polluted areas (the 48217 ZIP code, according to the toxicity score from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency).

“They’re going to do what they want to do,” said Jaye Rodriguez. “They don’t care about how we feel.”

“The fallout here is every day,” added Patricia Guziak, who lives less than a mile from the steel plant and several other factories.

“It has ruined the paint on my car. In the summertime, I’m sweeping up black dust every day. Dust is dust, but this is ot normal,” she said. “And the stink – you’ll get smells so bad you can’t sit on the porch.”

She and others who oppose the permit revision have until March 19 to make a comment.

Comment online, or send written comments to  Mary Ann Dolehanty, Permit Section Supervisor, MDEQ Air Quality Division, P.O. Box 30260, Lansing 48909-7760.  

An informational hearing will be held March 19 in Rooms 122 and 126 at Henry Henry Ford Community College, M-TEC, 3601 Schaefer Road, Dearborn. The informational session will begin at 6 p.m., at which time DEQ Air Quality Division staff will provide a brief introduction regarding the proposed project and will answer questions. The public hearing will begin at 7 p.m.