Hoquiam pellet plant opponents petition Superior Court
Published 1:30 am Friday, January 2, 2026
In November, the Washington Pollution Control Hearings Board (PCHB) upheld the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency’s (ORCAA) air permit to Pacific Northwest Renewal Energy to establish a wood pellet manufacturing facility at 411 Moon Island Road in Hoquiam.
City Administrator Brian Shay indicated at the time that the ruling “means that ORCAA can now issue the air permit, which is necessary to operate the facility once it is constructed. (Pacific Northwest Renewable Energy) has been waiting on this appeal ruling before they commence construction.”
In April of 2024, the project received a $200,000 grant from the state Department of Commerce through a program meant to accelerate manufacturing job growth. The project is supposed to create 53 jobs and generate $155 million in capital investment, according to the department. The U.S. Forest Service also approved a $300,000 grant for the project as part of their Wood Innovations grant program to expand forestry and lumber-related projects nationwide.
After ORCAA’s “Final Determination concluded the proposed facility meets all five criteria for approval in Washington and, therefore, may be conditionally approved,” Friends of Grays Harbor, Grays Harbor Audubon, Twin Harbors Waterkeeper, Natural Resources Defense Council and Wild Orca filed an appeal with the PCHB.
The PCHB concluded “that Appellants failed to meet their burden of proof to demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence that the Air Permit issued by the Olympic Clean Air Agency on May 14, 2024, granting Pacific Northwest Renewable Energy permission to establish a wood pellet manufacturing facility located at 411 Moon Island Road, Hoquiam, Washington, violates state or federal law. The Board also concludes that Appellants failed to meet their burden of proof to demonstrate that ORCAA’s decision to adopt the city of Hoquiam’s July 25, 2023, determination of nonsignificance was clearly erroneous under the State Environmental Policy Act. Therefore, the Air Permit, including its conditions and requirements, should be affirmed.”
However, the “Appellants,” Friends of Grays Harbor, Grays Harbor Audubon Society, Natural Resources Defense Council, and Twin Harbors Waterkeeper, have petitioned the Thurston County Superior Court “for judicial review of the Pollution Control Hearings Board’s (“PCHB”) Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Order dated November 14, 2025.”
In March, Lee First of Twin Harbors Waterkeeper wrote an op-ed opposing the plant, which was published in The Daily World. “Local groups filed an appeal of the project’s Air Operating Permit because PNWRE’s application vastly underestimated harmful air pollution that would be emitted from the facility,” First wrote. This argument appears to be the basis of the court petition.
The “petitioners” or “friends” are asking the Thurston County Superior Court to specifically find and declare that the PCHB improperly discounted Friends’ evidence showing that ORCAA failed to calculate VOC emissions from the wood piles, and remand to PCHB for further proceedings; find and declare that the PCHB erred in finding that ORCAA acted reasonably in relying on AP-42 emission factors for particleboard manufacturing to estimate emissions for PNWRE’s proposed industrial wood pellet manufacturing plant; find and declare the Permit ultra vires and vacate the Permit, remanding the NOC to ORCAA for further proceedings; enjoin PNWRE from constructing or operating the Industrial Pellet Plant without a valid NOC (Notice of Construction) from ORCAA.
The pellet plant promises an infusion of economic development in the city of Hoquiam and Grays Harbor County at large. According to the petition, “This plant will produce, store, and export up to 440,800 tons of dried wood pellets per year, operating at least 8,000 hours per year. It will be among the first of its kind in the Pacific Northwest and will sit adjacent to Gray Harbor National Refuge and near Hoquiam High School, Hoquiam Middle School, and residential and local park areas.”
First also mentioned the proximity of schools and students in the op-ed. “The proposed plant is very close to Hoquiam High School, Middle School and Emerson Elementary School, which are attended by 1,551 students. PNWRE claims the pellet plant would improve air quality by reducing the burning of slash, but a Mississippi study showed emissions from pellet plants, such as particulate matter, black carbon, nitrogen dioxide and volatile organic compounds, exceeded Clean Air Act thresholds by up to five times. It could dump 40 tons of hazardous air pollutants including 20 tons of methanol onto our children every year.”
A proponent of the pellet plant, Darrin Raines, CEO of Greater Grays Harbor, Inc., stated in an email that the facility would help alleviate unemployment in the area, particularly in the prime-age employment gap.
“We at Greater Grays Harbor, Inc. are very disappointed in this latest setback for PNWRE. Grays Harbor continues to struggle to attract new manufacturing jobs when appeals on approved permits, such as this one, keep stalling opportunities for new family wage jobs,” Raines said. “Grays Harbor County has a Prime Age Employment Gap (PAEG, ages 25-54) of 15% above the national average for people not working. This environmentally friendly business that will not cut any new trees, would take existing wood waste from being burned in slash piles, and process that into fuel, and would reduce the PAEG. PNWRE’s proposal exceeds any air quality requirements in Western Washington, which ORCAA has had to successfully defend this permit, wasting tax dollars. This business would also bring in a large amount of tax dollars into the city of Hoquiam and Grays Harbor County that would help reduce the burden on existing taxpayers.”
Shay, upon hearing the news of the filing of the petition for judicial review in Thurston County Superior Court, was dismayed.
“I’m extremely disappointed that these local citizens who are involved in these three different environmental groups continue to challenge every single industrial project that we have knocking on our door in our community that we desperately need for economic development, for jobs, for tax revenue to provide essential services like police, parks, and streets,” Shay said. “We need industry in Grays Harbor. We need industry in Hoquiam, yet these same groups continue to file appeal after appeal. Every project that comes our way, their goal is to just delay projects by appeal to ultimately kill them. And what they’ve appealed here is the state agency responsible for issuing air permits, specifically, whether a project meets the state air standards. They issued a permit for this pellet facility back in May of 2024. Here we are, 18 months later. Finally got a ruling that the permit should be issued and the project could move forward. It’s very disappointing, because in my mind, I would view our staging agencies like Ecology, (departments of) Natural Resources, Fish and Wildlife, to be the experts when a permit is issued, but to these environmental groups, they do not want development in our community. It doesn’t matter what it is. It’s very hurtful. These are local people in these groups who are leading the charge. They have for many years, and it’s just very disappointing.”
An administrative hearing is set for April 17 in Thurston County Superior Court.
