GLOSTER — Drax, the United Kingdom-based wood pellet producer that’s violated air pollution limits in Mississippi multiple times, is asking the state to raise the amount of emissions it’s allowed to release from its facility in Gloster.
In September, the state fined Drax $225,000 for releasing 50% over the permitted limit of HAPs, or Hazardous Air Pollutants, from its facility Amite BioEnergy. In a pending permit application that it submitted to the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality in 2022, the company is seeking to transition from a “minor source” of HAPs to a “major source.”
A “major source” permit would remove the limit over the facility’s total HAP emissions, but it would apply a new limit over the rate at which Drax could release the pollutants.
This year’s fine was its second penalty for violating Mississippi law around air pollution limits. In 2020, the state fined the company $2.5 million for releasing over three times the legal threshold of Volatile Organic Compounds, or VOCs, one of the largest such fines in state history. Drax underestimated its VOC releases since the facility opened in 2016, but didn’t realize it until 2018. The facility didn’t come into compliance until 2021.