What No Fine Can Repay: Living Downwind of a Mill That Didn’t Follow the Rules

Chillicothe, Ohio is a city of roughly 21,000 people. It sits in the Paint Valley, a bowl-shaped geography carved by the Scioto River, which means air does not move the way it does on open plains. Pollution pools. Stacks are visible from neighborhoods. The smell from kraft pulp mills, when the chemistry is running right and the controls are working, is already bad. The process boils wood chips in sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfide. It produces reduced sulfur compounds. The industry term for what escapes into the air when controls fail is “total reduced sulfur,” or TRS. The practical term is a rotten egg smell, thick enough to taste.

When Pixelle’s monitoring equipment for TRS, nitrogen oxides (NOX), and sulfur dioxide (SO2) went down for 3.45% of the second quarter of 2019, nobody in Chillicothe got a text message. Nobody paused their morning commute or kept their kids inside. The data simply did not exist. What came out of the No. 9 Recovery Furnace during those hours is not recorded. The federal permit requires continuous monitoring precisely because the consequences of not knowing are borne entirely by the surrounding community, not the company.

The Chemi-washer vent hood leaked for over 14 months. The document records the first inspection noting the defect: January 31, 2018. The document records the repair completion: April 18, 2019. The law requires a first repair attempt within 5 days. Pixelle tried and failed. Then tried again during a December 2018 outage. Also failed. The law allows delay of repair when repair is technically impossible without a full shutdown. Pixelle used that exception. For over a year, the gap in that hood meant that HAP gases, the kind that include compounds linked to neurological harm, respiratory damage, and cancer, found an exit that was not routed to any control device.

The steam stripper is the facility’s core mechanism for pulling hazardous chemicals out of condensate water before that water re-enters the environment or the atmosphere. It is supposed to capture 92% of what comes through it. During 16 days of testing in August and September 2022, the worst days it achieved only 48% removal. Think of it this way: if 100 units of a toxic compound enter that system, the law says no more than 8 should come out the other side. On the worst days Pixelle tested, 52 came out the other side. The people of Chillicothe are not given unit counts. They are given air.

Between 2019 and 2021, Pixelle’s own records count 55 events where the Sludge Blend Tank may have overflowed. When an EPA inspector walked onto the facility grounds on July 21, 2021, they saw sludge on the ground. Not in a tank. On the ground. The Sludge Blend Tank sits at a pulp mill. What runs through it is not benign. Pixelle cleaned and calibrated a sensor and gave operators extra training in May 2022. Those 55 prior events, and whatever was in the sludge that reached the ground, are settled history now for $234,440.

Carbon monoxide limits for the No. 1 and No. 2 Package Boilers were exceeded five times across Q4 2018 and Q4 2020. The opacity limits for the No. 9 Recovery Furnace were exceeded across four separate reporting periods spanning 2018, 2020, and 2021. Each “exceedance” is a reporting period in which the visible particulate emissions coming out of the stack crossed a legal threshold designed to protect air quality. Each one represents a real period of time during which the air near that facility was worse than the permit allows. Nobody compensated the people breathing it.

The Title V permit governing this facility expired on May 31, 2009. By Ohio law, it remained in effect while Pixelle waited for renewal. Ohio EPA did not issue the renewed permit until June 20, 2024. Every violation documented in this federal enforcement action occurred under a permit that had been sitting expired for between nine and fifteen years. Pixelle filed its renewal application in November 2008. The system meant to protect Chillicothe from this facility let the paperwork lapse for over a decade and a half. The community was not a party to that delay. They just lived in it.

Straight From the Document: What Pixelle Admitted, and What They Didn’t Have To

The following are direct, verbatim statements from EPA Consent Agreement and Final Order, Docket No. CAA-05-2025-0033, filed with the Regional Hearing Clerk on April 17, 2025. These are not allegations that went to trial. Pixelle waived its right to contest them.

“In its May 2, 2022 Performance Test Plan, Respondent stated: ‘The section of the Chemi-washer where the Knockoff Shower is used is the only section of the Chemi-washer that is not vented to and controlled by the HVLC system.'”
— Paragraph 79, Consent Agreement and Final Order

“The results of the 2022 Performance Test showed that the amount of HAP per ton of ODP removed by the Steam Stripper, as an average over 16 test days, was 8.0 pounds of HAP per ton of ODP. Each daily removal amount was below 10.2 pounds of HAP per ton of ODP.”
— Paragraph 84, Consent Agreement and Final Order

“A properly operated and maintained steam stripper is expected to achieve an actual HAP removal efficiency of 92%. 63 Fed. Reg. at 18,509. During the 2022 Performance Test, the Steam Stripper was tested over a range of operating conditions consistent with normal operations. The Steam Stripper achieved between 48% and 68% HAP removal efficiency.”
— Paragraphs 90–91, Consent Agreement and Final Order

“Respondent provided records of 55 potential overflows from the Sludge Blend Tank in 2019 to 2021. During EPA’s on-site inspection on July 21, 2021, EPA inspectors observed sludge on the ground near the sludge blend tank.”
— Paragraph 92, Consent Agreement and Final Order

“According to Respondent’s visual inspection records, Respondent documented a leak in the Chemi-washer vent hood on January 31, 2018. Respondent continued to document a leak in the Chemi-washer vent hood during each visual inspection through March 28, 2019.”
— Paragraph 116, Consent Agreement and Final Order

“Respondent waives its right to request a hearing as provided at 40 C.F.R. § 22.15(c), any right to contest the allegations in this CAFO and its right to appeal this CAFO.”
— Paragraph 8, Consent Agreement and Final Order

The Cost That Doesn’t Appear on the Balance Sheet

Public Health

The hazardous air pollutants regulated under NESHAP S for kraft pulp mills include compounds with documented human health impacts. When the control systems fail, those compounds go into the air people breathe. Here is what the documented violations mean in public health terms.

• HAPs from kraft pulp processes include methanol, acetaldehyde, formaldehyde, and various reduced sulfur compounds. Federal standards exist for these chemicals because chronic or acute exposure is linked to respiratory illness, neurological damage, and carcinogenicity. Pixelle’s steam stripper released, at minimum, 32 more units of these compounds per 100 entering the system than federal law permits.
• The Knockoff Shower section of the Chemi-washer emitted HAP-containing gases to uncontrolled air. The document does not quantify how much escaped. It was not measured because there was no required monitoring on an uncontrolled emission point. This is precisely the scenario NESHAP S was designed to prevent.
• Carbon monoxide exceedances from the No. 1 and No. 2 Package Boilers were self-reported on five days across Q4 2018 and Q4 2020. CO at elevated concentrations reduces the blood’s capacity to carry oxygen. The limit of 0.39 lbs per MMBtu was exceeded on those days; the document does not state by how much.
• Opacity exceedances at the No. 9 Recovery Furnace across four separate reporting periods indicate visible particulate matter was emitted above permitted levels. Particulate matter at elevated concentrations is one of the most consistently documented causes of premature death and cardiovascular disease in communities near industrial facilities.
• Monitoring downtime created information voids: 7.94% in Q2 2020 for opacity at the Recovery Furnace, 3.45% in Q2 2019 for TRS, NOX, and SO2 at the same unit, and over 9% in Q4 2020 for CO at the Package Boilers. When monitors are offline, emissions that may have exceeded limits during those periods are simply not on record.
• The 55 documented Sludge Blend Tank overflow events and the sludge observed on the ground during the July 2021 EPA inspection represent pathways for process chemicals to reach soil and potentially groundwater or surface water, extending the exposure vector beyond airborne transmission.

Economic Inequality

The economic reality of environmental enforcement against industrial facilities is a study in asymmetry. The people most exposed to the harm are rarely the people with power to respond to it. The mechanism of settlement reinforces that asymmetry.

• Chillicothe, Ohio is a post-industrial city where the paper mill is one of the major employers. The economic leverage this creates is real: communities near industrial employers often face a choice between jobs and air quality that wealthier, more politically connected communities never have to make. The EPA enforcement action addresses air quality violations but does not address this structural constraint.
• The $234,440 fine is the entire financial consequence of 11 separate categories of Clean Air Act violations spanning from 2018 through 2022. That works out to roughly $46,888 per year of documented noncompliance. For an industrial paper mill generating revenues at industrial scale, this is a cost of doing business, not a deterrent.
• The legal structure of the Consent Agreement and Final Order explicitly states that Pixelle “neither admits nor denies the factual allegations.” This means no affected resident, worker, or neighbor can point to this document as a legal admission of harm for the purpose of a civil lawsuit. The EPA resolved its case; the community’s options were not enlarged.
• The Title V air permit for this facility expired on May 31, 2009 and was not renewed until June 20, 2024. Every violation in this action occurred under that expired permit. Ohio EPA’s 15-year delay in renewing a permit for a major industrial HAP source represents a regulatory gap that exclusively disadvantaged the surrounding community, not the company operating under it.
• Penalties paid under this CAFO are explicitly non-deductible for federal tax purposes (Paragraph 129). However, the operational costs of running substandard pollution control equipment — including the maintenance that was not performed — remain deductible business expenses. The tax code offers the company no additional penalty for the underlying noncompliance.
• The maximum daily penalty the EPA could have assessed under Section 113(d)(1) is $59,114 per day of violation, up to $472,901 total. The actual fine of $234,440 represents 49.6% of the statutory maximum. No explanation for the reduction is provided in the public document beyond “Respondent’s cooperation” and the standard Section 113(e) factors.

Putting the Fine in Human Terms

According to EPA’s enforcement policy, cooperation credit and compliance history inform penalty reductions. No additional public breakdown of the penalty calculation appears in the CAFO document.

From First Violation to Final Order: A Timeline

The violations documented in this case did not arrive all at once. They accumulated over years while monitors went offline, equipment leaked, and sludge hit the ground. Here is the sequence as documented in the CAFO.

Who Is Accountable, Who Is Watching, and What You Can Do

The CAFO is signed and filed. Pixelle has certified compliance. That does not mean the work is done. Here is who signed, who is supposed to be watching, and where your energy can go.

Who Signed This Document

• John P. Jacunski, Senior VP and Chief Financial Officer, Pixelle Specialty Solutions LLC — signed the Consent Agreement on behalf of Pixelle on March 25, 2025.
• Michael D. Harris, Division Director, Enforcement and Compliance Assurance Division, EPA Region 5 — signed as Complainant on April 16, 2025.
• Ann L. Coyle, Regional Judicial Officer, EPA Region 5 — issued the Final Order on April 16, 2025.

The Watchlist: Agencies With Jurisdiction

• U.S. EPA Region 5 (Air Enforcement and Compliance Assurance Branch): The agency that brought this action. Contact: R5airenforcement@epa.gov. This office holds jurisdiction over ongoing CAA compliance at this facility. If you observe visible smoke, odors, or other potential violations at the Chillicothe facility, you can submit a complaint directly to Region 5.
• Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (Ohio EPA): The state agency that holds and enforces the Title V permit for this facility. Ohio EPA issued the renewed permit on June 20, 2024, after a 15-year lapse. They have authority to inspect, enforce, and revoke permits under Ohio Admin. Code Rules 3745-17-07 and 3745-31-05.
• U.S. Department of Justice (Environment and Natural Resources Division): The DOJ jointly authorized the extended enforcement period for this case. They retain authority to bring civil action in federal court if Pixelle fails to pay the assessed penalty per 42 U.S.C. § 7413(d)(5).
• EPA’s Office of Inspector General: Independent watchdog for EPA’s enforcement decisions. If you believe the $234,440 penalty was inadequately justified relative to the severity and duration of violations, a complaint can be filed at oig.epa.gov.

What You Can Do Right Now

• Demand the renewed permit be made public and scrutinized: Ohio EPA issued Pixelle’s renewed Title V permit in June 2024. Request a copy from Ohio EPA under Ohio’s Public Records Act. Compare the emission limits and monitoring requirements against the violations documented here. Permits are supposed to prevent these failures; verify that the 2024 permit addresses each of them.
• Connect with Chillicothe-area environmental and community health organizations: Local and regional groups focused on Paint Valley air quality and industrial accountability are the most direct pathway for residents to organize collective pressure on regulators and elected officials. Find them through Ohio Environmental Council (ohioenvironmentalcouncil.org) and Ohio Citizen Action.
• File formal air pollution complaints when you observe violations: Ohio EPA and EPA Region 5 both accept public complaints about visible emissions, odors, and other potential violations. Documented community complaints create a paper trail that strengthens future enforcement actions. Do not assume someone else has already reported it.
• Contact your Ohio state representatives and U.S. House and Senate delegation: The 15-year permit renewal gap at this facility is a policy failure that requires legislative attention. Ask your representatives what oversight mechanisms exist to prevent a major industrial HAP source from operating under an expired permit for over a decade, and what they intend to do about it.
• Monitor EPA Region 5’s enforcement docket: New enforcement actions, inspection reports, and compliance certifications are public record. Pixelle’s docket number is CAA-05-2025-0033. Follow it and watch whether the company’s certification of compliance holds up under subsequent inspection.