Officials with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment touted the new permit as more stringent than previous water-pollution permits that have regulated the refinery.
The Suncor Energy refinery’s Outfall 20 along Sand Creek in Commerce City, Colorado, on Wednesday, July 12, 2023. Colorado issued a new, long-overdue water-pollution permit to Suncor Energy on Wednesday that restricts the amount of “forever chemicals” and other harmful pollutants the company’s Commerce City refinery can discharge into Sand Creek, an important source of water for drinking and agricultural irrigation in the state.
“It’s more restrictive than the previous permit in a couple of ways,” said Trisha Oeth, the state health department’s director of environmental health and protection. “One, it will limit the amount of pollutants that Suncor can discharge into Sand Creek and other downstream waters. There’s also a component in there to prevent future spills and seeps, so there’s a really robust inspection and maintenance requirement.
Mike Freeman, a senior attorney with EarthJustice’s Rocky Mountain Office, said the permit gives Suncor an “extraordinarily long time to comply with permit limits.” Suncor is Colorado’s only refinery and it faces intense scrutiny from environmentalists and people who live in the neighborhoods that surround the Commerce City plant who are concerned about the large amounts of pollution it pumps into the air and water. That public pressure has pushed state environmental regulators to tighten the rules the refinery operates under.
Suncor’s Commerce City oil refinery sits along Sand Creek in Commerce City, pictured on Tuesday, April 19, 2022. Suncor’s water permits were last renewed in 2012 and are supposed to be updated every five to seven years. However, the state health department did not start the current renewal process until 2021. It tookbecause of the extensive number of public hearings the state held and because it issued more than one request for information from Suncor, Oeth said.
Suncor was given extra time to comply with the PFAS limits based on “technological feasibility and potential for needed infrastructure changes,” Beekman said. But those provisions would be included in the next renewal of the permit. When Suncor’s last permits were issued there were no regulations for PFAS, and since the state began drafting the refinery’s newest permit, the guidance on those chemicals has changed as scientists learn more.
While environmental advocates who had weighed in on the process were still digesting what exactly is included in the new permit, they already were critical of the PFAS standards. Benzene is a chemical naturally found in crude oil and gasoline that can cause blood diseases, cancer and menstrual irregularities through long-term exposure. It is part of a group of compounds known as BTEX — benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene — and for the first time the permit will regulate those other compounds, Rowan said.
Under the new permit, Suncor will be required to conduct inspections of its facility weekly or twice-monthly and during heavy rain or snowmelt, Oeth said. The state also will require Suncor to submit an asset management plan that tracks maintenance schedules across the refinery property so the state can make sure the refinery stays on top of repairs and upgrades to its equipment.
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