air quality permit

Connie Swinney •
Staff Writer •

Grant Dean has a message for the state of Texas and a New York-based company looking to launch a mining operation on 280 acres between two subdivisions in Spicewood in Burnet County.

“This is not just our backyard,” Dean said. “This is everybody's backyard.”

Dean, the co-founder of the Texas Environmental Protection Coalition, has rallied support from several cities in Texas with similar battles before them – rock crusher/quarry operations setting up stakes next to residential neighborhoods.

The latest proposal involves a pending air quality permit by Spicewood Crushed Stone, a company owned by Dalrymple Companies, based in New York.

If approved by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the company would operate on 280 acres, in the 5500 block of Texas 71, between Double Horn Estates (100 home lots) and the fledgling Spicewood Trails.

Note: Read all the responses, "TCEQ Response to Comments Asphalt Inc 148112," here, at HighlanderNews.com: http://bit.ly/2Aeg8cm

By Lew K. Cohn

Managing Editor

The Highlander

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has granted an air quality standard permit for a permanent rock and concrete crusher to Asphalt Inc. for a new plant to be built south of Marble Falls near US 281.

By Lew K. Cohn

Managing Editor

The Highlander

Texas Commission on Environmental Quality officials told Marble Falls Mayor John Packer Thursday they did not know of proposed housing developments planned for south of Marble Falls when they reviewed an air quality permit application by Asphalt Inc. for a rock crushing plant, but added they would have made no difference.

“I didn't know about the new (Gregg Ranch) housing development or the (Baylor Scott & White) hospital or any of the infrastructure that was there,” said Don Nelon of the TCEQ Air Permits Division. “However, if there would have been a map which identified every existing house, every future house and all new businesses it wouldn't have mattered. If they are outside 440 yards of the rock crusher, there will not be an impact from this plant.”

By Lew K. Cohn

Managing Editor

The Highlander

Texas Commission on Environmental Quality officials do not believe a rock-crushing plant south of Marble Falls would have an impact on air quality at Baylor Scott & White Medical Center, according to a letter sent to state Sen. Dawn Buckingham Thursday.

However, the letter also states the TCEQ “does not operate an air quality monitor in the immediate area of the proposed facility” with the closest particulate monitoring station some 25 miles east of the proposed plant site.

Earlier this month, Buckingham, R-Austin, had sent a list of questions to TCEQ executive director Richard A. Hyde PE about the impact the proposed Asphalt Inc. facility would have on air and water quality and how its permit would be enforced prior to a scheduled 7 p.m. Oct. 26 informational meeting about the permit at Lakeside Pavilion in Marble Falls.

By Lew K. Cohn

Managing Editor

The Highlander

A former Marble Falls mine safety engineer has warned members of a group fighting a proposed rock crushing plant of the dangers of “fugitive dusts” that will escape the facility if an air quality permit is approved by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, stating the plant should have been required to perform “air dispersion modeling” due to the proximity of Baylor Scott & White Marble Falls hospital.