Louisiana Hit with Federal Lawsuit Over De-Facto Ban on Use of Air Pollution Monitoring by Community Groups
New industry-friendly state law blocks neighborhood data collection used to warn about deadly pollutants
NEW ORLEANS — Today, a coalition of environmental and community groups filed a federal lawsuit challenging a new, industry-friendly Louisiana law that effectively bans community groups from using their own air pollution monitoring to warn local residents or publicly advocate for cleanup action.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana in Baton Rouge against state officials who are tasked with enforcing the Louisiana Community Air Monitoring Reliability Act (“CAMRA”) by the Environmental Integrity Project and Public Citizen Litigation Group on behalf of RISE St. James, Claiborne Avenue Alliance Design Studio, The Concerned Citizens of St. John, The Descendants Project, Micah 6:8 Mission, and JOIN for Clean Air.
The law, signed by Governor Jeff Landry on May 23, 2024, threatens to impose penalties of up to $32,500 per day – plus $1 million for intentional violations — on neighborhood groups that publicly discuss their use of low-cost, commercially-available air pollution monitoring devices to detect dangerous levels of ethylene oxide, a known carcinogen, fine particulate matter, and other harmful chemicals released by nearby chemical plants, refineries, and other industries.
Community groups in Louisiana’s “Cancer Alley” and other industrial zones have been relying on their own independent air monitoring systems to warn residents about public health threats that polluting industries might not want to monitor or publicize. The new state law effectively bans the use of data from all but very expensive, EPA-approved air monitors – which can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per monitor — that only the state and industry can easily afford.
“Our legislature and officials should do everything in their power to stop industry from polluting our air in the first place,” said Dr. Joy Banner, Co-Founder of The Descendants Project. “To attack our first amendment rights instead is arcane, illegal, and dangerous.”
(See below for more quotes from the environmental and community groups taking legal action and a leading scientist.)
According to the complaint filed by the organizations, the CAMRA law’s stated purpose to provide the public with “accurate” air quality information in practice suppresses accurate evidence necessary for people and communities to know what they are breathing. The law does this by preventing the use of this data to allege air quality violations, and threatening people who do so with enormous financial penalties for doing so.
Costs for air monitors allowed by the Louisiana law are often several times higher than what community groups can afford. For example, one type of monitor that community groups often use to measure potentially deadly particulate matter costs about $289 per unit, while the costs for a particulate monitor required by the Louisiana law is $58,691.
While lower-cost air monitoring devices commonly used by neighborhood groups are not the same as the expensive, EPA-approved monitors required by the CAMRA law, these community monitoring devices can also provide accurate data that performs a valuable service, especially in states like Louisiana that mostly leave it up to polluting industries to monitor their own emissions.
The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act made $81 million in grants available for community air monitoring projects as part of efforts by Congress to help protect communities of color and lower-income neighborhoods that bear a disproportionate burden of industrial air pollution, including in “Cancer Alley.” The industry-friendly 2024 Louisiana CAMRA law works to block those community air monitoring efforts.
For example, Micah 6:8 Mission, an environmental justice organization based in southwest Louisiana, bought an air monitor with an EPA grant to measure nitrogen oxides and particulate matter pollution in Sulphur, LA, by the Westlake chemical plant complex near Lake Charles. The monitor found that on more than two-thirds of days, people in their community breathe unhealthy levels of particulate pollution, which can trigger heart and asthma attacks.
Micah 6:8 Mission previously posted this monitoring data on their Facebook page but has now stopped out of fear of CAMRA’s penalties. The Louisiana law bars Micah 6:8 Mission from letting community members know if their air is not safe to breathe.
Other community groups are also conducting air pollution monitoring – but are now not sharing their monitoring data with the public – out of fear of being slapped with steep penalties under the new state law.
More quotes:
Nandan Joshi, attorney with Public Citizen Litigation Group, said: “Community air monitoring is a critically important tool for detecting air pollution levels in communities in Louisiana that have too often been neglected. The state should be supporting community groups that are helping protect the health of Louisianians by monitoring air pollution, rather than suppressing their speech and threatening them with sanctions.”
Caitlion Hunter, Director of Research and Policy at RISE St. James Louisiana, said: “RISE St. James Louisiana fought this law every step of the way through the legislature last year, and now with the help of EIP and Public Citizen Litigation Group, we continue our fight in federal courts. It’s no coincidence that just as fenceline communities were securing air monitoring systems through EPA grants, polluting industry pushed through a dirty bill designed to silence the science.”
Amy Stelly, Director of the Claiborne Avenue Alliance Design Studio, said: “It is disappointing that Governor Landry, a student of environmental science, supports a law that punishes community members and environmental groups for publishing data that informs citizens and warns them about public health threats and deadly pollution. It’s time for Louisiana to change its course and put people first. The State must stop the threats and reduce the harm.”
Justin Vittitow, Director of the New Orleans-based JOIN for Clean Air, said: “The Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality has failed to resolve the toxic fumes issue plaguing our neighborhood. This law adds insult to injury, penalizing the residents who are fighting to restore and protect our clean air through community air monitoring and advocacy. We have a right to freedom of speech. This new law is an attempt to silence our voices.”
Cynthia Robertson, Executive Director of Micah 6:8 Mission, said: “This law is an attack on truth and on our community’s right to protect itself. We use both EPA-funded equipment and other monitors to track pollution levels in real time—tools that have helped us uncover serious threats that were never disclosed to the public. Now, Louisiana wants to silence us for doing what the state refuses to do—tell people what’s in the air they breathe. We won’t stop fighting for our community’s right to know.”
Peter DeCarlo is an Associate Professor of Environmental Health and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University who studies air pollution using cutting-edge mobile labs and sensors whose data might be prohibited from public disclosure under the new law. He said: “Measurement technology continues to improve, and the cutting-edge instruments used by scientific researchers offer faster, more accurate, and more sensitive measurements of chemicals in the air we breathe. Limiting the use and sharing of data generated by these advanced measurements ignores scientific advancements and limits the protection of community health.”
David Bookbinder, Director of Law and Policy at the Environmental Integrity Project, said: “This new law is a blatant violation of the free speech rights of community members to use their own independent air pollution monitoring to raise alarms about deadly chemicals being released into their own homes and neighborhoods. Self-monitoring by polluters is not enough to protect public health.”
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