Saint-Gobain Containers has reached an agreement with the Department of Justice & the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the US to resolve alleged violations of the country's Clean Air Act at its plant in Madera, CA. The agreement means that SG will reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides, sulphur dioxide and particulate matter by 400/tpy by installing $6.6M worth of new equipment. The company will also pay a civil penalty of $929,000 and $1.2M for an environmental project to reduce emissions. The EPA had accused SG of failing to apply BAT to control NOx emissions when it modified a furnace in 1998. It also alleged that SG failed to install a continuous emissions monitoring system to measure NOx emissions in 2002, failed to test emissions in 2000/1, and improperly certified that the facility complied with federal law in 2000/1.
