The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality votes Wednesday on whether to propose a rule that would stop companies with poor compliance records from slipping back into the state’s simplest water pollution permits through an automated approval. The public can speak at the meeting, three minutes each, near the end of a long agenda.
Most Texas operations that discharge wastewater do not hold an individual permit. They sign up under a general permit — one standard authorization covering a whole category of dischargers, which is faster and cheaper for the company and for the agency. State law already lets the agency’s executive director refuse a general permit to a discharger rated unsatisfactory on compliance history. What it did not say was what happens after that. Senate Bill 1302, passed in 2025, closed the gap: once an authorization is denied or suspended, the discharger stays out until the executive director actively lets it back in, and no automated process may do that. The bill cleared the Senate 30-0 and the House 135-4, and took effect last September.
The rest of the agenda shows what compliance history is meant to measure. Forty items are enforcement orders, most of them agreed orders — negotiated settlements in which a respondent accepts a penalty without contesting the allegations. The names include Dow Chemical, Shell, Chevron Phillips, Valero, TotalEnergies and ArcelorMittal, alongside the cities of Austin, Plano, Tyler and Fort Stockton. The agenda does not print penalty amounts; those are in the individual orders.
Two items reach further. Commissioners take up administrative law judges’ recommendation on U.S. Ecology’s bid to renew and amend seven deep injection well permits at Winnie, in Jefferson County, which would put nonhazardous industrial and municipal waste underground under revised pressure limits. Because that one went to a contested hearing, someone objected. Commissioners also consider renewing the statewide permit for spraying pesticides into or near water to kill mosquitoes and other pests.
A vote to propose is not a vote to adopt. If the commissioners approve the compliance-history rule Wednesday, it goes out for a formal public comment period and comes back to them later for a final decision.
Meeting at a glance
- When
- 9:30 a.m. CT Wednesday, August 12, 2026. The notice was filed August 4.
- Where
- 12100 Park 35 Circle, Building E, Room 201S, Austin.
- Governing body & chair
- Texas Commission on Environmental Quality — three full-time commissioners named by the governor to staggered six-year terms, with a two-term limit. Brooke T. Paup, chairwoman.
- Format
- In person, with a Zoom webinar and a call-in line. Public comment is item 47: three minutes a speaker, one hour total. A closed session on litigation is noticed.
- Live video
- TCEQ webcasts · Zoom webinar ID 857 3027 6214, access code 018717.
- Full agenda
- Secretary of State Open Meeting Viewer · TCEQ agenda listing
Commissioners
- Brooke T. Paup — chairwoman; designated by the governor.
- Catarina R. Gonzales — commissioner.
- Tonya R. Miller — commissioner.
Roster from the agency’s Office of the Commissioners page, which also sets out the six-year staggered terms and two-term limit. Commissioners are full-time state officials based in Austin; the agency does not publish hometowns. Staff: Mary Smith, general counsel; Laurie Gharis, chief clerk; Garrett T. Arthur, public interest counsel.