Yes there are a lot of permits, but it helps to put these in perspective. At 0.17 tpy PM10, we could get one of these a week every week for 10 years and not generate as much particulate as one Longview. And even that pales in comparison to the 1000's of tons per year from Fort Martin. Still given our limited volunteer resources, and the level of effort needed to produce a real change in any permit, we would do well to pick our battles carefully, and concentrate on winning something in each of those we do pick. WV-DEP is already quite willing to ignore anything we say, so we need to be sure we retain credibility and win some of these, rather than develop a reputation as the ones who cry wolf every week and can routinely be ignored. I don't insist on total unconditional surrender from DEP, but I want them to know that when I raise an objection, they have to take another look. My vote is to focus on the "Big Dirties" or the "Dirty Dozen Worst Polluters", those that have a substantial impact on air quality. I would prefer to avoid gaining a reputation as being against every small business expansion or new job that comes to town. If we create a precedent with the big (out-of-state) companies, the nature of regulatory bureaucracies is that they will tend to spread it through the rest of industry.

JBK

P.S. I also like the idea of having a "Monitoring Committee" produce a summary of sources in Mon County or the region. If we compare these permits to the power plants, or to auto traffic, or diesel trucks, it gives people a perspective that is hard to get from "tons per year".

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-----Original Message----- From: mvcac-bounces@cheat.org [mailto:mvcac-bounces@cheat.org] On Behalf Of Linda Shuster Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 1:41 PM To: John Gever; mvcac@cheat.org Subject: [BULK] - Re: [MVCAC] Marion County, Shuck Steel Fabricators Inc., R13-2621

At 12:58 PM 6/22/05 -0400, John Gever wrote: I agree with John on this. We all receive a ton of emails each day that we have to sort through. I think we need to be very judicious about what MVCAC sends out. Perhaps one of our standing committees could start keeping data on permit applications - perhaps the Monitoring Committee?

Linda

So does email. Applications for air quality permits are pretty

frequent

and people may develop mail-list fatigue if we get emails on each and every one of them. May I suggest restricting these broadcasts to those

highlighting particular concerns? At the same time, I agree it's

useful

to be aware of the many contributors to local air pollution -- a good MVCAC project might be to add up all the new sources permitted each

year

and issue a report.

Just my $0.02.

John Gever

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Linda I. Shuster, Ph.D. website: http://www.wvu.edu/~speechpa/shust.html Associate Professor Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology PO Box 6122 805 Allen Hall West Virginia University Morgantown, WV 26506 Telephone: 304-293-2943 or 304-293-5050 Fax: 304-293-7565

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