Six sources of pollution in Fairfax County — among them institutions such as George Mason University and the National Air & Space Museum annex — last year violated federal limits on emissions that led to smog, according to a county environmental report released Monday.
The annual report, from the Fairfax County Environmental Quality Advisory Council, also cited Fort Belvoir, the Upper Occoquan Sewage Authority, Nextel Communications and Motiva Enterprises, a joint venture between Shell and a Saudi refining company.
They are the only six organizations among the county’s 78 permitted pollution sources to have exceeded the limits, according to the document. Most were cited for an excess of nitrogen oxide emissions.
The findings were based on Environmental Protection Agency data.
“Notably, all six of these firms are emitting pollutants that contribute to smog and which cause the metropolitan area to violate the national ozone standard,” the report said.
Two of the organizations cited — the Upper Occoquan Sewage Authority and Fort Belvoir — dispute the report’s accuracy. Evelyn Mahieu, regulatory affairs coordinator for the sewage authority, said they received a notice of violation last year in error.
Fort Belvoir spokesman Don Carr said the Army base was cited for an EPA violation that was “administrative in nature.”
“There was no violation of our permitted emission limits,” he said.
The county has no means to enforce the standards or to help it reduce the pollution, the report said.
Fairfax turned over its enforcement of air pollution regulations to the state and cut most of its related staff in 1997, according to the report.
Representatives of Nextel, Motiva, GMU and the Air & Space Museum declined to comment Monday or could not be reached.
Also on Monday, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors criticized the Mirant Corp.’s plan to combine its smokestacks at its Alexandria plant, which would send pollutants higher in the air and over a broader range.
The board approved sending a letter to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, calling on the company to install technology to “control air pollution rather than disperse it through a stack merger.”
