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70,000 Call on BP to Halt Planned Dumping
CHICAGO, Illinois—Environment Illinois today
presented BP and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials with more
than 70,000 thousand signatures from Great Lakes region residents demanding a
halt to BP's unprecedented expansion of pollution into Lake
Michigan.
The petitions are in response to a
pollution discharge permit granted in June by Indiana's Department of Environmental
Management (IDEM). The new permit will allow BP's oil refinery in Whiting,
Indiana to increase its discharge of ammonia to
1500 pounds and sludge particles to nearly 5,000 pounds every day into
Lake Michigan.
BP's new permit runs counter to
decades of Great Lakes clean up efforts. It is
the first time in years that any company has been allowed to increase toxic
dumping into Lake
Michigan.