After receiving a notice that Freeport-McMoRan was to conduct a maintenance acidization job at the Jefferson Drill site November 18th, community members organized and conducted a community phone-in to report the inevitable odors that would result from the acidization job. A frequent complaint of residents near the drilling site is the constant and nuisance odors that come during hours of activity. The Air Quality Management District (AQMD), which regulates air quality in the South Coast basin, has a stringent set of rules and protocol that places the onus of identifying public nuisance facilities on the community. They require 6 residents from 6 different households to call in a complaint and verify the complaint on-site with an inspector hours later before an odor mitigation plan will be implemented. Residents have shared that after calling in a complaint AQMD inspectors have taken up to 7 hours to respond, often they do not bring monitoring equipment, and they always call the drill site to warn them that they are on their way.
Video Capturing the Protest
News clips covering the protest
Results
Although we were able to log 20 complaints at the AQMD this morning - it was insufficient to count as an public nuisance odor complaint. A couple AQMD inspectors arrived an hour after calls were made, and could not verify the odor upon arrival. An additional inspector arrived with the monitoring equipment 2 hours after calls were made and did not find any leaks.
It also turned out that the acidization job was cancelled Wednesday morning and reschedule 2 more times before the acid trucks arrived Monday morning.
It also turned out that the acidization job was cancelled Wednesday morning and reschedule 2 more times before the acid trucks arrived Monday morning.
Several of the protesters from Wednesday helped make odor complaints Monday morning. Our continued efforts to log odor complaints will dispute FMOG’s claims that drilling operations have no impact on the surrounding community by providing first-hand accounts of the many ways the site has threatened their health, safety, and quality of life of their families.
For information on calling AQMD to report odor complaints, visit our resources page
For information on calling AQMD to report odor complaints, visit our resources page