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What the permit dispute is about
ABC Coke is a by-product coke facility in Jefferson County, Alabama. An October 1, 2026 report by Inside Climate News describes the plant as owned by Drummond Coal and identifies the disputed application as ABC Coke’s 2023 air-permit renewal. The report says the Jefferson County Department of Health (JCDH) issued a draft permit in January 2026, but progress then stalled.
On September 30, 2026, GASP, represented by SELC, petitioned Jefferson County Circuit Court to compel local health officials to act. The petition argues that the delay denied GASP and its members rights under the Clean Air Act and local air rules. Those are the petitioners’ allegations, not conclusions reached by a judge in the reporting available here.
Who says the delay is whose responsibility?
GASP and SELC: the county had a duty to act
GASP and SELC contend that the health officer had a statutory, nondiscretionary duty to process the renewal. They argue that the delay deprived the group and its members of procedural and substantive protections. GASP Executive Director Jilisa Milton said, “Communities should not have to wait indefinitely for the protections the law requires.”
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JCDH: it was waiting for an EPA assessment
In a September 2026 letter to SELC, Health Officer David Hicks said the department “respectfully disagrees with the assertion that it has failed to fulfill its obligations under applicable law.” Hicks said JCDH was awaiting a Trump administration EPA “regulatory assessment.” The EPA had not answered the reporter’s questions about that assessment, and the report does not provide it. SELC argued that no assessment was required and that JCDH should send a proposed permit to EPA for its formal 45-day review.
These are competing positions. The available reporting does not establish that a court has decided whether JCDH breached a legal duty, or whether the agency’s stated reason justified its pace. The petition described in the report targets county health officials’ inaction; it does not establish that ABC Coke caused the county’s delay.
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What changed after the petition—and what did not
On October 2, 2026, one day after the petition was filed, JCDH told SELC it was moving forward with the permitting process, according to an SELC representative quoted by Inside Climate News. SELC said after filing that it was “one step closer to ABC Coke having a renewed permit.” The reported update shows movement, not completion: the source does not report a final renewed permit, its conditions, or a court ruling.
| Stage | What the reporting establishes |
|---|---|
| Application | ABC Coke submitted the renewal application in 2023, according to Inside Climate News. |
| Draft permit | JCDH issued a draft in January 2026, according to the report. |
| Proposed permit and EPA review | SELC says JCDH should send a proposed permit for EPA’s formal 45-day review. The report does not say that this review began. |
| Process moving forward | JCDH told SELC on October 2, 2026 that it was moving the process forward, according to an SELC representative quoted in the report. |
| Final permit or court outcome | Not established in the October 1 report and October 2 update. |
A draft permit, a proposed permit sent for federal review, and a final issued permit are distinct procedural stages. The reported October update does not establish that the process passed from one stage to another.
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Why the dispute matters to nearby communities
Foundry coke is a high-carbon fuel made by heating coal to extreme temperatures. Inside Climate News reports that ABC Coke has long polluted the air in Tarrant, next to north Birmingham, and says the company agreed in 2019 to pay a $775,000 civil penalty over alleged Clean Air Act violations involving benzene releases. These descriptions and the penalty figure are reported by the outlet; they are not findings independently established here.
The same report summarizes fenceline monitoring at multiple coke-oven facilities in Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Alabama as recording benzene levels as high as 14 times the occupational exposure limit recommended by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists. It says ABC Coke monitoring was more than 60 percent above that threshold and cites a modeled estimate of up to 1.7 additional cancer cases per 10,000 people in mostly Black areas of north Birmingham and Tarrant.
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Those are consequential figures, but the cited article does not provide the underlying monitoring dataset, modeling methods, or assessment. They should be read as figures reported by Inside Climate News, not as independently verified measurements or calculations, or as figures published by ACGIH or EPA.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What the older EPA-hosted petition can—and cannot—show
A 2019 GASP petition hosted by EPA identifies an earlier permit as number 4-07-0001-04 and describes the facility as the largest merchant producer of foundry coke in the United States and Mexico. It provides historical context, but concerns an earlier permit proceeding; it does not establish the status or terms of the 2023 renewal.
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What remains unresolved
- Whether a court will decide that JCDH violated a legal duty, and what relief it might order.
- Whether the EPA assessment cited by Hicks exists and what it says; the EPA had not responded to the reporter’s questions about it.
- Whether JCDH’s October 2 statement leads to a proposed permit, EPA review, or a final renewed permit.
- The permit’s eventual conditions and the underlying data and methods for the exposure and risk figures reported for nearby communities.
The reporting cited here does not include the court docket, later filings, the full 2023 application and permit record, the EPA assessment, or the underlying monitoring and risk-analysis documents. The latest specific status available here is JCDH’s October 2, 2026 statement that it was moving the process forward.
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