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Database of Biorefinery Air Pollutant Emission Permits

Biorefineries, like other industrial facilities, require permits to emit air pollutants. Typically, air emission permits both to begin construction and later to begin operation are required. The permit applications necessitate interpretation of air quality regulations to determine applicability, process designs that ensure emission limits are met (through use of emission control technology or other means), and detailed calculations of estimated air emissions, all of which must be appropriately documented for review by the state air permitting agency and for public record. To help accelerate the process of permitting of new biorefineries for their air emissions, a topic which has received relatively little attention in the research and development community, researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory bioenergy air quality team have collected air emission permits for extant first and second generation (corn starch and cellulosic) biorefineries in the contiguous United States. The air permit status is summarized in an attached spreadsheet, which can be searched for specific biorefineries, conversion pathways, feedstocks or fuel products. When available, the permits as issued (in public record) by the states are provided in zip files for each state. The information summarized and the collected permits are accurate as of mid-December, 2016; they are subject to change thereafter so users are recommended to always check for the most current permit status through the state permitting agency.

Author(s)
Arpit Bhatt , Garvin Heath
Contact Person
Arpit Bhatt
Contact Organization
National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Contact Phone
Contact Email
Bioenergy Category
Publication Date
DOI is live on OSTI.
Project Title
Biofuels Air Emissions Analysis
WBS Project Number
4.2.1.30
Data Source
State Air Permitting Agency Websites
Usage Policy
These are public documents that do not have usage policy restrictions
Funded from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Bioenergy Technologies Office.
Attachment Size
 Biorefinery Air Permits Database (current as of Dec 16, 2016).xlsx 249.53 KB
 AZ.zip 600.22 KB
 CA.zip 21.46 MB
 CO.zip 2.88 MB
 FL.zip 5.44 MB
 HI.zip 661.29 KB
 IA.zip 14.87 MB
 ID.zip 1.37 MB
 IN.zip 23.28 MB
 KS.zip 18.94 MB
 LA-1.zip 62.01 MB
 LA-2.zip 61.06 MB
 MO.zip 353.01 KB
 MS.zip 276.16 KB
 NC.zip 1.69 MB
 NV.zip 7.23 MB
 OH.zip 5.71 MB
 SD.zip 3.97 MB
 WI.zip 20.05 MB