4/7/25 Collaborative Release

New Analysis Shows Extensive Number of Facilities Across the U.S. That Could Get a Trump EPA Pollution Pass

Administrator Lee Zeldin Invited Facilities to Seek Exemptions from Vital Toxic Pollution Limits

(Washington, D.C. – April 7, 2025) Today, a coalition of health, community and environmental groups released new analysis documenting the extensive number of high-polluting industrial facilities that Trump EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has invited to seek exemptions from national limits on hazardous air pollution. These industrial sources emit toxic pollution such as mercury, arsenic, chloroprene, ethylene oxide and many other contaminants associated with serious adverse health effects, including cancer.

On March 24th, Administrator Zeldin launched a website offering to help industrial sources emit hazardous air pollution instead of complying with existing clean air standards. The website identifies nine different standards that protect people from toxic and hazardous air pollution and encourages the “regulated community” to apply for special Presidential exemptions from these safeguards. The site has step-by-step instructions on how to apply for the exemptions and a deadline of March 31st.

Today’s analysis identifies more than 500 facilities in 45 states across the U.S., plus Puerto Rico, that emit toxic and hazardous air pollution and that Administrator Zeldin invited to apply for pollution exemptions. The greatest number of facilities are large petrochemical manufacturing plants (218 facilities) and coal-fired power plants (151 facilities). 

The states with the most sources are Texas (98 facilities), Louisiana (54 facilities), and Ohio (27 facilities). The full analysis includes more detailed information, including the Congressional districts where these facilities are located and their ownership.

Some pollution sources have already submitted requests seeking broad-based exemptions from these vital safeguards. Lobbyists for the American Chemistry Council (ACC) and the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) – trade associations for some of the largest industrial polluters in the U.S. – asked Administrator Zeldin to provide a two-year compliance exemption for “all sources” required to meet national limits on hazardous pollution. (EDF has just released a new map that takes a closer look at the serious health risks from petrochemical pollution.) And operators of the coal-fired Colstrip power plant in Montana are seeking a two-year exemption from compliance with an update to EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, which limits air pollution that causes brain damage in developing children.

EPA has not made the requests for exemptions public, so it is unknown how many more facilities have applied. Several groups that released today’s analysis have also filed requests under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) for all records related to the website, including which entities are requesting the exemptions and any records related to Administrator Zeldin’s reckless invitation to industrial emitters of toxic pollution.

Because of its importance to public health and safety, the Clean Air Act has strong requirements for public participation and transparency. EPA’s unprecedented sweeping solicitation of exemptions from vital national pollution standards would evade these requirements. It seeks no information or public comment from people exposed to toxic air pollution every day around the facilities EPA has invited to seek exemptions, and it appears to include no consideration of public health or environmental impacts at all.

QUOTES

“This new analysis shows that Administrator Zeldin’s reckless and dangerous invitation for industrial sources to evade compliance with national pollution limits on the most toxic contaminants puts millions of Americans in harm’s way. Communities across America are at risk, and people now have to worry more about their children getting sick from breathing toxic air pollution and their family members getting cancer. We call on EPA Administrator Zeldin to immediately withdraw this dangerous action and to carry out his solemn responsibility under our nation’s clean air laws to protect the American people from air pollution. – Vickie Patton, General Counsel, Environmental Defense Fund

"It's disappointing that years of progress for cleaner air can be casually cast aside. American communities will suffer the consequences." – Mark Barker, Executive Assistant (Roanoke, VA)  Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League

 “This ‘free Presidential pass to pollute’ in the guise of a Presidential exemption for our nation’s dirtiest, most toxic polluters puts frontline communities at risk from exposure to dangerous, highly toxic chemicals such as lead, arsenic, chloroprene, ethylene oxide, benzene, hexavalent chromium and other highly toxic chemicals. This action sacrifices the rights of communities facing the constant barrage of pollution from industries that can well afford the pollution controls to reduce the emissions. It is simply an unconscionable act by this administration.” – Jane Williams, executive director, California Communities Against Toxics

 "Fenceline communities in Pennsylvania are already suffering a public health crisis from living through more than a century of recklessly polluting heavy industry. This exemption process is yet another novel way for the administration to favor billionaires and make sure that more of our neighbors breathe toxic air and are sickened and killed." – Alex Bomstein, Executive Director, Clean Air Council

 “What country is this? What kind of government rolls back rules that would lower the life expectancy of its citizens? These rules were passed to protect the lives of Americans from environmental transgressors. In places like Laredo on the South Texas border, this move will accelerate rates of cancer from dangerous air toxics like ethylene oxide. We must stop them from killing us.” – Tricia Cortez, co-founder, Clean Air Laredo Coalition 

 “I can’t believe that we now have no protection from these highly toxic emissions which are placing our children at such risk that we have to move our school away from Denka’s fenceline. What about the rights, the health, and the wellbeing of the people who are suffering and dying from exposure to this pollution? The President is making sure these polluting plants have the right to kill us.” – Robert Taylor, Director, Concerned Citizens of St. John

 “Trump’s EPA is keeping requests for these exemptions secret because it knows how outrageous it would be to issue permission slips for hundreds of chemical and coal companies to release toxic fumes that harm kids’ development, trigger asthma, and cause cancer. While the Trump administration lets corporations cash in, communities will pay the price in sickness and soaring medical bills.” – James Pew, Director of Federal Clean Practice, Earthjustice

 "The Trump administration's talk of exemptions from air pollution rules is an abuse of the Clean Air Act and will undermine the health and wellbeing of communities across the country. These rules are meant to keep mercury pollution from coal plants out of the air we breathe and limit cancer causing benzene and other toxic emissions from steel and petrochemical plants that cause real harm to the American people. Instead of focusing on implementing the commonsense protections required by law, President Trump is sacrificing our health to give polluting corporations a break they are not entitled to." – Jen Duggan, Executive Director, Environmental Integrity Project

 “No company polluting our Great Lakes and Midwest communities should be allowed a ‘get out of jail free card’ from responsibility to comply with our nation’s Clean Air Act and other environmental protection laws. The Environmental Law & Policy Center (ELPC) is specifically calling for accountability from U.S. Steel and Cleveland-Cliffs with their three steel mills on the Lake Michigan shoreline to come clean and say publicly if they have sought or plan to seek exemptions.” – Howard Learner, Executive Director, Environmental Law & Policy Center

 "With each blow of deregulation, we suffer the consequences of a government that upholds greed over human lives. Northwest Indiana leads the country in toxic emissions per square mile and is ground zero for the steel industry and its legacy impacts. These exemptions will give corporations free rein to pollute and poison us in the name of economic prosperity – prosperity for the Billionaires and Fossil Fuel Lobby at the cost of everyday people and workers, the Great Lakes watershed, and beyond. We must rise up and fight back for our future and the future of every community being sacrificed under this administration!" –  Ashley Williams, Executive Director, Just Transition Northwest Indiana

 “EPA Administrator Zeldin is offering the country’s most dangerous polluters a Free Pass to Pollute, courtesy of President Trump. Zeldin has even offered EPA’s services to help them apply! But let’s call this what it is: A travesty. It is astonishing to see an EPA administrator offer polluters speedy permission to spew toxic pollutants that will hurt children and families for generations. These hazardous air pollutants damage every organ in our bodies. Children and the elderly are especially vulnerable. Millions of mothers have an email for Lee Zeldin: ‘Exempt yourself from your position, ASAP. Your job is not to Make America Sick Again.’ Hitting Send!” – Dominique Browning, Director and Co-Founder, Moms Clean Air Force 

 “These industries are not in your backyard, Mr. President, we live here in Cancer Alley at the frontline of pollution from the petrochemical industry – we live here! These industries come here to pollute, to destroy our communities, our health, our children. This action you are taking to excuse them from the duty of controlling their toxic emissions put us in danger. Our lives matter!” – Sharon Lavigne, Executive Director, Rise St. James.

 “For the last 40 years, the Sierra Club has worked with communities along ‘Cancer Alley’ in Louisiana to ensure that they have clean air to breathe. We have worked hard to pass good laws and regulations to clean our air. It is outrageous that now these corporations, who have poisoned our air for decades in Cancer Alley, can email the EPA and get a free pass to continue their unjust poisoning of our communities.” – Darryl Malek-Wiley, Senior Field Representative for New Orleans, Sierra Club

 “Exempting industrial facilities from air toxics rules means that more Americans are at risk of dying from cancer, more children could be born with life-impairing birth defects, and more families face the fear of discovering that they are unable to have children at all. No one voted for dirty air that makes people sick.” – Keri N. Powell, Air Program Leader, Southern Environmental Law Center

 “These exemptions undermine decades of hard-won progress to protect communities that have been burdened by industrial pollution for far too long. The EPA standards, which were established through tireless advocacy and effort, are vital safeguards for public health and worker safety. Allowing these protections to be weakened for corporate gain is an affront to the health and well-being of our communities in Houston’s East End, Manchester community, and it sets a dangerous precedent for all fenceline communities across the United States. The health of our communities cannot be compromised for profit, and these exemptions will only worsen the burden of cancer, asthma, and other health conditions. This is a direct attack on public health — unconscionable, discriminatory, and driven by corporate interests at the expense of people’s lives.” – Ana Parras, Executive Co-Director, Texas Environmental Justice Advocacy Services

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Media contact: Susan Thomas, Just Transition Northwest Indiana (JTNWI) Policy and Press Director, susan@jtnwi.org