Joining the efforts of three Indiana environmental groups, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has filed an appeal against the expansion of the BP refinery in Whiting, Indiana. The New York-based environmental group moved to halt the expansion of the plant on behalf of "Save the Dunes Council, the Sierra Club's Hoosier chapter, the Hoosier Environmental Council and two Lake County residents," according to the Indianapolis Star.

During an interview with WBEZ's Eight Forty-Eight this morning, NRDC senior attorney Ann Alexander explained the group's concerns about the emission calculations used by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management [IDEM] in approving BP's expansion permit:

ALEXANDER: What's wrong with the math is that there's a whole lot of emissions that they didn't include in the math. [...]

[BP is] building three big new flares and they’re also specifically intending to use the eight existing flares more. There’s going to be more going through those flares and they’re building three new flares. The problem here is that they did their math -- they calculated their emissions in determining that those emissions were going to go down by assuming that those three big new flares they’re building were never going to be used. We think that is unrealistic and frankly irresponsible not to count the emissions that are going to come out of those. [...]

We want them [IDEM] to do an honest evaluation of what the emissions are going to be from this expansion, because I think when you do that evaluation you find that they're going to increase significantly.

The NRDC also announced plans to file a federal lawsuit against BP, alleging that the oil giant has not made a good faith effort to explore ways of limiting pollution.

If the appeals are deemed credible by the Indiana Office of Environmental Adjudication, construction may be halted at the Whiting refinery. As Progress Illinois previously reported, Prairie State lawmakers and environmentalists are also concerned about the impact the BP expansion could have on Illinois air quality.