Analyze

From its earliest settlement on through to more recent demographic booms, Austin's developers and city planners have tended to recognize the bucolic landscape surrounding the city as a significant draw that should be preserved. For this reason (along with the relative lack of mineral resources), Austinites have managed to stave off the "smokestack" approach to development, and preserve its unique ecologies, green spaces, and relatively clean air and water resources.

Despite this fact, however, not all of Austin's citizens have had equal access to these clean and green spaces. Austin's eastern corridor has long served as the city's official sacrifice zone. The City's first Master Plan in 1928 established East Austin as mixed use, serving as the zone for the city's industrial development as well as the segregated district for all of Austin's communities of color. Despite legal segregation ending with Brown v. Board in 1954, the vast majority of Austin's black and brown residents continue to live in this formerly segregated district. And the blatantly unjust mixture of industrial and residential zoning in East Austin had also persisted long after de jure segregation had ended. Thus, I would argue that Austin's environmental liberalism is, itself, and environmental hazard, as Austin's reputation for climate and ecological consiousness has masked the environmental injustices long perpetuated in the city and by the City.

Since the early 1990's, however, environmental justice groups have pressured the City to recognize and address this text-book example of environmental racism, with People Organized in Defense of Earth's Resources (PODER) being a notable leader on this front. Some significant victories include the relocation of a bulk fuel storage facility known as the "Tank Farms," a metal foundry, a waste management facility, and eventually, the re-zoning of East Austin's neighborhoods to prevent further industrial development. A few years later, PODER also successfully pressured the city to close the Holly Street Power plant which, for decades, had produced considerable noise pollution, caused local fires, and emitted high rates of nitrogen oxide that contributed to ozone. Decker Creek Power station, which is located at eastern edge of Austin's city limits, runs on natural gas, has long been a target for closure by local environmental and environmental justice organizations. This video shows an interesting look at the power plant, using different filters to render otherwise invisble pollution more legible, providing a composite picture of pollution at this site. Though, the viewer's understanding the video is hampered due to the lack of any commentary or explanation of the filters used and what they might mean. This plant was scheduled for closure in March of 2022, but there have been no updates on this closure at this time of this annotation (Nov 2022).

At a grander scale, but also much like how Austin relegated the city's environmental risks to its eastern cooridor, the City of Austin has produced environmental hazards that are more displaced from Austin's residents and cherished local landscapes and ecologies. For instance, the vast oil and gas resources controlled by UT Austin, the flagship university of the University of Texas system, have long been deployed to aquire or develop infrastructure to attract high-tech industry to the city. And the map of these oil and gas leases correlates strongly with the highest rates of cancer risk due to air pollution in the state. The City's public utilty, Austin Energy (AE) also owns ecologically destructive assets that compromise public health in well-removed places. For example, AE's dirtiest energy asset, the Fayette Power Plant (FPP), is located 64 miles away in La Grange, Texas. This coal plant is the 16th largest polluting facility in the state of Texas, emitting mercury, lead, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, particulate matter, and other pollutants that are associated with ecological destruction, cancer, and other serious health conditions. In 2004, the Clean Air Task Force conducted a study that estimated econmoic damages related to the ecological and public health impacts from FPP's pollution at $5.6 million annually. After decades long battle, AE's share of the FPP (AE owns 1/3 of the plant, the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) owns the other 2/3) was slated for closure in 2022, according to the 2017 Resource Generation and Climate Protection Plan. In november of 2021, however, it was announced that negotiations with LCRA broke down, and Austin Energy's share of the plant is no longer expected to close any time soon.

Aside from these pollutive industries, the City of Austin (along with Central Texas more generally) is notoriously flood prone. In just five years, between 2013 and 2018, Austin experienced three 100-year floods, resulting in extensive financial and infrastructural damage as well as significant loss of life. In 2018, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Atlas 14 detailed the flood risks in central Texas, which were considerably higher than previously thought. The shock induced by this study provoked ATX Floodplains, Austin's a 5-year project to re-assess and remap Austin's floodplains and adjust insurance requirements/premiums and emergency planning accordingly.