INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Federal regulators alleged Friday that BP PLC violated a host of Clean Air Act provisions by making unapproved changes to its oil refinery along Indiana’s Lake Michigan shoreline that significantly boosted the plant’s pollution emissions.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency detailed the alleged violations in a 15-page letter sent Thursday night to the manager of the 1,400-acre Whiting, Ind., refinery — the nation’s fourth-largest — just southeast of Chicago.

In particular, the EPA’s regional office in Chicago said BP failed to obtain a permit in February 2005 when it altered the refinery’s fluidized catalytic cracking unit, which converts heavy oils into lighter products such as gasoline.

Those modifications caused “significant increases” in the refinery’s releases of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, particulate matter and carbon monoxide, said Bill McDowell, the section chief of the Chicago EPA office’s air enforcement branch.

“If you’re going to change or modify a major source of pollution such that you increase emissions you have to get a permit for those modifications,” McDowell said Friday.

BP spokesman Scott Dean said in a statement that the company has “cooperated fully with EPA on this matter and will continue to cooperate.”

The company has 10 days to request a conference with the EPA about the changes at the refinery, about 20 miles southeast of downtown Chicago.

McDowell said BP would likely face penalties for the unapproved changes unless it can convince the agency that its allegations are incorrect.

In Thursday’s letter, the EPA also said that recent inspections at the refinery found that BP had also modified its flares — the tall chimney-like structures used to burn off waste substances — without complying with Clean Air Act emission standards.

Those changes caused the refinery to exceed sulfur dioxide emission limits, it said.

The agency also said BP failed to monitor emissions from several sources and did not conduct “timely performance tests” of hydrogen chloride emissions from its catalytic reforming units, which convert low-octane refining byproducts into high-octane liquid products.

The alleged violations come months after a public uproar over a water discharge permit BP obtained in June from Indiana for a planned $3.8 billion expansion to boost the refinery’s capacity to process heavy Canadian crude.

That permit significantly boosts the refinery’s allowed discharges of ammonia and suspended solids. Environmentalists said it would add to pollution in Lake Michigan, which Chicago and other cities in Illinois and Indiana draw on for their drinking water.

In August, after weeks of criticism, BP said it would find a way to comply with the lower ammonia and suspended solids discharges set in its earlier permit or cancel the expansion.

The EPA’s allegations prompted U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., to send BP officials a separate letter asking them to explain their actions and what steps they would take “to bring the Whiting refinery into compliance.”

Dean, who said the EPA’s letter alleges “a number of past rule violations,” said the Whiting refinery’s overall air emissions have been cut 68 percent since 2001. “BP hopes to resolve differences of opinion with the regulator regarding interpretation of the rules which were enacted by EPA in support of the Clean Air Act,” Dean’s statement said.

The company filed an application Oct. 31 with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management seeking a new air emissions permit to support the refinery’s planned expansion.

IDEM spokeswoman Amy Hartsock said the state agency will assist the EPA with its investigation of the Whiting refinery, if it requests help. She said the case’s outcome could have an impact on IDEM’s regulation of the refinery, including the pending air permit application.

Howard Learner, the executive director of the Chicago-based Environmental Law and Policy Center, said the higher pollution emissions the EPA alleges the refinery’s modifications will add to global warming, ground-level ozone and acid rain.

He said the allegations are the latest blow to BP’s efforts to promote itself as an environmental friendly company.

“BP can and should be an environmental business leader, but if they’re going to talk the talk, they’re going to have to walk the walk when it comes to reducing air and water pollution,” Learner said.

Posted 12/3/2007