In my opinion, something that is ethically wrong with this case is the fact that much of the pollution coming from biomass factories like Enviva are disproportionately affecting Black and Brown rural comminities. These communities experience health issues from the saw dust and can be seen cleaning sawdust off their outside belongings. It is important to see how much thes communities are impacted when looking at biomass corporations.
The complaints of Duplin County residents and the Environmental Justice Community Action Network about general permitting for hog farms in Eastern NC. These permits would give way to more ground and water pollution due to the relaxed regulations on corporate farms that hold multiple different numbers of livestock. Plans for the implementationa pipline called the "Grady Road project" interrupt the family and small scale farms in the ares. A quote from the Duplin County NAACP president Robert O. Moore says:
"The corporation has refused to implement any technology to clean up the water, citing the cost of doing so was too expensive. Yet the cost of this biogas project rivals the cost that would have been to implement cleaner and safer technology to ensure the safety of those living near these operations."
Many local groups in Eastern NC counties have previously tried to receive assistance to help with their agriculture waste managment systems, yet fall short due to many government officials only focusing on corporate farms.
Read more at the link: https://southerlymag.org/2022/03/24/biogas-could-do-more-harm-than-good…
Early local organizing that uses conflict and difference as a way to generate transformative solutions. Solutions that serve more then one worldview instead of growing otherness, separateness, and hierarchy. In the book Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown, brown states...
At the human scale, in order to create a world that works for more people, for more life, we have to collaborate on the process of dreaming and visioning and implementing that world. We have to recognize that a multitude of realities have, do, and will exist.
An example of success using this strategy is the Dogwood Alliance in joint with other partners who put a stop to a wood pellet mill in Lumberton, NC. The article located on the Dogwood Alliance webpage about this victory states the following.
THE CLOSURE OF THIS FACILITY IS ALSO A WIN FOR OUR CLIMATE. THE BURNING OF THESE PELLETS WOULD HAVE ADDED THOUSANDS OF TONS OF CARBON DIOXIDE TO THE ATMOSPHERE, THE EQUIVALENT OF 155,580 CARS ON THE ROAD.
Link to this webpage: https://www.dogwoodalliance.org/2022/04/statement-wood-pellet-mill-stop…
In an article written in August 2022 details the complaints of residents of Duplin County and the Environmental Justice Community Action Network in response to a general permit for hog farms in Eastern North Carolina that would pollute the ground and water by relaxing regulations on farms with varying numbers of livestock. A quote from Sheri White-Williamson, cofounder of the Community Action Network, says,
“A general permit is a one-size fits all system, regardless of the number of animals you have,” she said. “That doesn’t seem to make good environmental sense. At the very minimum we would like to see the denitrification system that has shown to be better for taking care of the toxins that come out of this process. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened.”
Local groups urge the DEQ to set regulations on a case by case basis depending on the size of biogas operations and should require cleaner systems and ways of getting rid of waste.
The article is linked here:https://coastalreview.org/2022/08/groups-challenge-ncs-biogas-general-p…
This July 14th news article (Oglesby 2022) mentions the The Waterkeeper Alliance as a stakeholder group commenting on biogas projects:
Waterkeeper Alliance, an environmental group, also criticized the general permit, calling it “woefully inadequate” and saying it fails to assure compliance with water quality protections required under North Carolina law.
Note that the case study for Calhoun County, Texas revolves around a clean water lawsuit against Formosa Plastics, led by a group of actvists associated with the Waterkeeper movement. See the essay The Waterkeepers Win.
From a recent news article (July 12, 2022):
On July 1, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (NCDEQ)—the state’s environmental regulator—issued general biogas permits for swine, cattle, and wet poultry operations, allowing them to bypass individual water quality review and public hearing processes when installing an anaerobic digester on their lagoons. The permits are in effect until Sept. 2024.
[...]
The permits reduce communities’ ability to weigh in on individual projects and will fast-track biogas operations in the state. Environmental groups heavily opposed the draft released in February.
See the first part of the article series here.
This event was the City Council meeting for the City of Santa Ana on february 15th 2022. The meeting took place in the city of Santa Ana council chambers. This meeting was organized by the city and city council. The purpose of this event was to award community members, pass agenda items, and listen to community concerns.
Council members Phan, Penaloza, Lopez, Barcerra, Hernandez, and Mendoza were all present along with Mayor Sarmiento. It is important to note that during agenda item number 26 Councilmember Phan left the chambers due to a formal complaint filed against her. During public comments on agenda item 26 Council members Hernandez and Penaloza left for unexplained reasons and missed the majority of public comments. Councilmemebr Lopez was not present for MPNA comments and a few oteh republic comments. I think that Councilmembrs Hernandez and Penaloza leaving during public comments on thai matter indicates a lack of interest and support for community members.
The most notable speakers at this event were community members who talked during public comments, city council, and the Mayor.
Many public comments were made on this matter with many written letters sent to the council which were not read during the meeting. The most notable public comments were made by the director of OCEJ, executive director of MPNA, attorney with the environmental law clinic at UCI,
Consensus amongst most commenters was that the city should not be moving forward with the GPU until they conduct better community engagement and address the EIJ in more detail.
After public comments the mayor started off the council comments by saying he was not prepared to move forward on the city plan. He did however say that he would like to move forward with the general plan by the next meeting. He explained how the council immediately stopped pushing the general plan when they received a letter from the attorney general telling the city they must engage with the community on EIJ concerns. He also pointed to how after this letter the council held hundreds of meetings with EJ groups. After saying these things he said that in all this time there has not been enough movement and at this point the EJ groups are delaying the city plan which has been nearly 7 years in the making. He finished by saying that the EJ groups are hurting the communities that they want to protect and that there will be one more meeting and we are done.
Council-member Bacerra said we need to pass the plan tonight and that two more weeks will not do anything. He said that the EJ groups keep demanding to move the goal post further and are not offering any solutions, all they want is more time.
Council-member Penaloza agreed with Bacerra’s statements and further stressed how the council has held hundreds of meetings. He stated that in all of these meetings all the EJ groups wanted was more time and when given the time they offered no solutions to EIJ.
Council-member Lopez did not want the plan to move forward. She cited lead pollution data sources to show how the city needs to do more in regard to the GPU. She said tha too many of her constituents have concerns over EJ in the city plan so she does not want the GPU to move forward.
Council-member Hernandez did not say a lot other than agreeing that the plan is taking too long and should be moved forward.
Council-member Mendoza agreed with Lopez in saying that the general plan does not cover enough EJ problems and said the plan should not move forward.
After these statements Council-member Penaloza then tried to present a notion to pass the general plan. Bacerra then said he would want to make some amendments first before passing the plan which was done on the spot. Most amendments changed some language in the GPU EJ section. The most notable amendment was the adding of a permanent EJ staffer on the city staff. After these amendments were made Penaloza attempted to pass the notion which failed with a 3-3 vote. Council-members Lopez, Mendoza and Mayor Sarminto voted against the notion.
The mayor stated the amendments were hastily put on the GPU and that the council needed to wait 30 days before passing the plan. With this the Mayor attempted to pass a notion giving EJ groups 30 days to come up with bullet points on what they wanted passed. This notion also failed with a 3-3 vote. Council-members Hernandez, Bacerra, and Penaloza voted against it.
This resulted in the agenda item to be later discussed at the next town council meeting.
Groups referred to by Councilmembers and the Mayor were Madison Park Neighborhood Association (MPNA), Orange County Environmental Justice (OCEJ), and the University of California, Irvine (UCI). EJ groups such as MPNA and OCEj were mentioned by council members to explain which groups they have worked with. The mayor called out these groups to identify the EJ group that must provide the council with bullet points on their concerns. The mayor also referenced UCI to explain his disappointment in the school and said that he would expect better from the institution.
Meetings with these EJ groups were also mentioned heavily from council members Bacerra, Pendaloza, and Mayor Sarmiento. The point of referencing these meetings was to show council has held hundreds of meetings with EJ groups and still have not been offered any solutions or given any ideas for what the city plan update (CPU) should have in its EJ section.