Environmental groups file lawsuit to stop coke oven pollution exemptions
Several organizations filed a lawsuit Monday challenging exemptions granted by President Donald Trump’s administration that would allow coke ovens to release chemicals that cause dangerous air pollution.
Organizations involved include the Environmental Law and Policy Center, EarthJustice, Just Transition Northwest Indiana, Hoosier Environmental Council and Sierra Club.
“This latest coke oven proclamation continues the Trump administration’s year-long pattern of undermining industry compliance with toxic air pollutant standards by granting baseless exemptions and delays,” Brian Lynk, senior attorney at the Environmental Law and Policy Center, said in a press release. “The communities that live with these plants and depend on clean, healthy air, in Northwest Indiana and across the country, deserve better.”
Coke ovens are used in steelmaking, heating coal to produce coke, which is used as fuel. Furnaces are a “major source of hazardous pollution,” according to the Environmental Law and Policy Center, which includes toxic chemicals and metals, including lead, mercury and benzene.
In November, Trump issued a proclamation granting regulatory relief for coke ovens nationwide, according to the White House, saying a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency coke oven rule imposes “heavy burdens on the coke production industry” and affects U.S. infrastructure, defense and national security.
“Many of the testing and monitoring requirements set forth in the Coke Oven Rule rely on technologies that are not practically available, are not demonstrated at the necessary scale, or cannot be implemented safely or consistently under real-world conditions,” the proclamation states. “Due to the cumbersome implementation of the Coke Oven Rule and the timeline for compliance with these standards, many coke production facilities find themselves in the impossible position of designing and developing new systems with unproven technology in a short period of time.
It allows a two-year exemption to the coke oven rule because Trump claimed the technology did not exist commercially and could not allow companies to comply with the rule. The Environmental Law and Policy Center says the exemption applied to more than 180 facilities in six sectors.
“The Trump administration is dealing another blow to local communities,” Tosh Sagar, senior attorney at EarthJustice, said in a press release. “These illegal exemptions have real consequences for real people. As people living near these toxic coke ovens breathe poison every day, polluting companies get another pass. Corporate profits must not come at the expense of public health.”
According to the Environmental Law and Policy Center, the EPA finalized revisions to the Clean Air Act that introduced the 2024 Coke Oven Rule, which “introduced a requirement for fencing monitoring, stricter limits on leaks from coke oven doors, covers, and battery intakes, and new emission standards for several hazardous air pollutants.”
The compliance deadlines were staggered between July 2025 and January 2026.
“Communities living near the steel industry’s coke ovens have advocated for many years for common-sense federal regulations to protect them from dangerous air pollution,” Haley Lewis, senior attorney for the Environmental Integrity Project, said in a news release. “EPA’s 2024 rule requiring air monitoring and cleanup of dangerous levels of pollution from coke ovens would have made significant improvements if President Trump had not granted an exemption last month. This exemption should be rejected by the courts for the sake of the health of all workers and families living near the industry.”
mwilkins@chicagotribune.com
