October 9, 2026
Amanda Stone, Deputy Director
Arizona Department of Environmental Quality
Subject: Time-sensitive request for ADEQ review of Freepoint Eloy air permit C31386.R01
Dear Deputy Director Stone:
We hope this finds you well. We were colleagues of dearest Hazel Chandler, our former Arizona state coordinator for Moms Clean Air Force, and we know how much she appreciated working with you. Hazel was the first to flag concerns about the proposed pyrolysis incinerator in Eloy, and we were all grateful for the thoughtful legal memorandum from ADEQ on June 17, 2024.
We are writing because we have reviewed the newly-released Air Quality Permit C31386.R01, issued by the Pinal County Air Quality Control District (PCAQCD) on September 23, 2026, to Freepoint Eco-Systems Eloy Recycling LLC. The permit and supporting documents include what appear to be significant errors in law and in fact. We are writing to share our concerns and to seek your guidance on how to proceed.
The PCAQCD’s summary and response to comment document and draft final permit make a number of questionable and at times factually inaccurate assertions, including explanations around the applicability of Section 129 of the Clean Air Act. The explanations provided are not only internally contradictory, but we believe they are legally deficient and rest on flawed legal interpretations. For example, in the response to comment document, PCAQCD concludes that Freepoint is categorically outside Clean Air Act Section 129 because pyrolysis is thermal decomposition rather than combustion and operates without oxygen. This is not factually accurate, does not reflect EPA’s existing regulations, and cannot serve as a federal applicability determination. Curiously, the permit does cite Section 129 in its listing of currently enforceable applicable federal requirements, and goes on to rely on an exemption from the very rules its response to comment document says do not apply.
Arizona’s classification of pyrolysis as a manufacturing process may affect regulation under certain state laws, but it cannot trump Section 129 of the federal Clean Air Act or inform federal permitting decisions. The permit itself highlights this problem. It recognizes 40 CFR Part 60, Subpart AAAA as a federally enforceable applicable requirement, yet exempts Freepoint from much of Subpart AAAA only “to the extent” it meets the federal plastics and rubber recycling-unit exemption.
We believe Freepoint’s eligibility for the exemption on which the permit relies is questionable at best. Specifically, the permit tries to skirt the Section 129 Small Municipal Waste Combustor pollution control requirements by claiming that the proposed plastics incineration facility meets the EPA’s exemption for plastics/rubber recycling units, 40 CFR 60.1020(h). EPA’s Small Municipal Waste Combustor rules define the “plastics/rubber recycling unit” as follows:
“Plastics or rubber recycling unit means an integrated processing unit for which plastics, rubber, or rubber tires are the only feed materials (incidental contaminants may be in the feed materials). The feed materials are processed and marketed to become input feed stock for chemical plants or petroleum refineries…. Each calendar quarter, the combined weight of the feed stock that a plastics or rubber recycling unit produces must be more than 70 percent of the combined weight of the plastics, rubber, and rubber tires that recycling unit processes…” [Emphasis added] (40 CFR 60.1465).
The 70% threshold to meet the requirements of the exemption represents a high bar; based on the recent closure of Freepoint’s only existing facility (in Hebron, Ohio), which failed to meet the threshold for this same exemption earlier this year, we believe it is likely not achievable. At a bare minimum, the permit should clearly lay out the requirements of the exemption including reporting obligations, which it does not.
On this matter, the permit conflicts with the instructions provided by ADEQ in the June 2024 memorandum, “Applicability of Municipal Waste Combustion NSPS to Freepoint Eco-Systems.” ADEQ writes, “If Freepoint wishes to invoke this [plastics/rubber] exemption, then it must demonstrate that the Facility's operation will meet these requirements.” Among those prerequisites is that Freepoint “must submit data and analysis demonstrating that the weight of the hydrocarbon feedstocks the Facility produces and markets will be at least 70 percent of the weight of the waste materials serving as inputs.” There is no indication that this data analysis has been submitted by Freepoint, and, if it was, how it demonstrated the threshold could be met. PCAQCD should require a demonstration that the threshold can be achieved before this exemption can be relied upon in the final permit.
The amount of plastic waste that becomes feedstock for chemical plants or petroleum refineries is tightly bounded by material retention rates and by the required dilution with virgin hydrocarbon liquids, since the pyrolysis oil made from plastic waste is so toxic, acidic, and corrosive—not just to human health, but also to the cracking machinery at chemical plants and petroleum refineries. “Input feedstock” would hardly be an accurate term for this highly hazardous material. So as not to corrode the steel, destroy the expensive reactor tubes, or deactivate the catalysts in the steam cracker, chemical plants and refineries have to dilute pyrolysis oil with vast amounts of virgin petrochemical feedstocks. Among other factors, this reliance on dilution with virgin feedstock makes the 70% threshold unlikely to be achieved.
Freepoint’s recent experience in Hebron, Ohio, brings this issue into sharp relief. In an April 2026 Notice of Violation, Ohio’s Environmental Protection Agency (“Ohio EPA”) stated that Freepoint reported that the weight of “pyrolysis oil produced and marketed” was below 70% of the weight of plastics processed during the third and fourth quarters of 2025 and the first quarter of 2026. Ohio EPA identified violations of Subpart AAAA and asked Freepoint to promptly come into compliance. Without even trying to demonstrate it could come into compliance and meet this 70% threshold, Freepoint EcoSystems opted to shut down their Hebron facility.
Among other important requirements, Clean Air Act Section 129 explicitly controls the potent carcinogens and other hazardous air pollutants released by pyrolysis incinerators such as Freepoint. If Freepoint is nonetheless allowed to operate outside the requirements of the waste-combustion rules, we are puzzled to see that the permit cites those rules as the currently federally enforceable applicable requirements and goes on to rely on an exemption from those very rules. If nothing else, Freepoint’s claimed eligibility for the 70% rubber/plastics recycling exemption is highly suspect based on recent events and deserves further scrutiny.
The permit also fails to apply the Title V requirements explicitly required under Section 129(e) of the Clean Air Act. These operating permits are critical to local communities seeking clean air protections. Title V permits serve to advance compliance, transparency, enforcement, and accountability. Thus, we question the draft permit’s suggestion that Freepoint’s desired exemption from Title V permitting requirements would provide the public with “a maximum degree of assurance.”
We respectfully request your guidance on appropriate next steps. PCAQCD provides a 30-day window during which adversely affected community members may request a hearing (by October 23), but given the novel and (in our view) erroneous legal and factual bases on which the permit relies, we suggest that ADEQ may find it appropriate to assert jurisdiction over this permit and initiate a review.
Thank you for your service to protect the communities of Arizona. Given the scale of the proposed facility (burning 386,250,000 lbs of plastic waste per year) and the anticipated harm to the children and families of Eloy and surrounding areas, we believe ADEQ review is warranted.
Sincerely,
Cynthia Palmer, Moms Clean Air Force
Pita Juarez, Moms Clean Air Force Arizona
Ralph Atchue, Concerned Citizens of Pinal County
Rita O’Connell, Beyond Plastics