EPA Denial Of Texas Offshore Oil Terminal Air Permits Sets Tough Precedent

EPA’s recent denial of air permits for a Texas offshore oil transfer terminal sets a tough precedent for other potential offshore permitting decisions, after the agency found the Trump administration wrongly cited regulatory ambiguity to exempt the project from air toxics rules that in fact clearly apply to marine tank loading facilities. In a Sept. 1 letter to the offshore facility developer Bluewater Texas Terminals, LLC (BWTX), David Garcia, director of the Air and Radiation Division in EPA Region 6,...