UPDATED EPA LIST: Exide has most plants in violation of air safety laws for lead emissions
Last week, the EPA added five sites to its Lead National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) Non-attainment Designations list, making a total of 21 areas and parts of 22 counties across 15 states and Puerto Rico that are in violation of federal air quality health standards for lead emissions. You can download a copy of the updated list here.
EXIDE OWNS ALMOST ONE-THIRD OF THE PLANTS ON EPA NON-ATTAINMENT DESIGNATION LIST
The additional sites that violate federal air quality safety regulations for lead emissions are in Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Puerto Rico and Kansas, The Kansas location is the Exide lead smelter in Salina, KS.
The addition of the Salina facility to the EPA list means that Exide -Â one of the world’s largest producers, distributors and recyclers of lead-acid batteries – now has six out of the 21 facilities that do not meet safe air quality laws – almost one-third of the violators, 
and more than any other company. (The Exide plants in violation of EPA lead emission standards are located in Frisco, Vernon, CA, Muncie IN, Salina, KS, North Reading, PA, and Bristol, TN.)
Also, when you look at the EPA non-attainment list and compare it to a listing of Exide’s U.S. facilities, out of the company’s six remaining recycling facilities (there were seven, but Exide closed its Baton Rouge plant in 2009), five out of the six of its remaining U.S. recycling plants are in non-attainment status.
In addition, out of Exide’s seven U.S. manufacturing facilities, two are on the EPA lead nonattainment list – the Salina, KS, and Bristol, TN plant, which is the world’s largest battery production and distribution center.
EXIDE CLOSING BRISTOL MANUFACTURING PLANT; QUESTIONS RAISED ABOUT FEDERAL FUNDING, STATE TAX INCENTIVES
Also last week, Exide announced that it is closing the Bristol manufacturing plant. In 2009, Exide won $34.3 million in federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act Funding for a proposal for its Bristol and Columbus, GA., plants to make batteries with advanced carbon technology.
Exide also received as much as $15 million in tax incentives and other benefits for a ten-year period from the states of Tennessee and Georgia for the Bristol and Columbus plants. With the Bristol plant closing, questions are being raised about the federal funds and state and local tax incentives that Exide received for the Bristol plant.
