10/04/2026
Some groups have a narrative about how this victory was accomplished -- a narrative that does not include the important role of a whistleblowers and those who support them. This post is to fill in those gaps.
In November 2019, a worker at the Curtis Bay Energy medical waste incinerator reached out to Mike Ewall at Energy Justice Network, author of the Baltimore Clean Air Act. The Baltimore Clean Air Act was supported by 36 organizations and was unanimously adopted by Baltimore City Council in 2019. It set strong standards for waste incinerators and would have forced the closure of the Curtis Bay Energy medical waste incinerator as well as the much larger Wheelabrator Baltimore trash incinerator in September 2020 if not for a federal judge incorrectly declaring that the local law is preempted and outgoing Mayor Young cutting a deal that dropped the legal appeal.
The Curtis Bay Energy whistleblower, whose identity we will continue to protect, was not at a low level in the company, and revealed to us that the company's strategy was to keep the Baltimore Clean Air Act in litigation so they could keep operating for years without complying. They also revealed and documented criminal conduct by other workers and managers and provided pictures and videos to back it up, some of which are posted here.
Ewall immediately involved the Environmental Crimes Unit at Maryland's Office of Attorney General, and enforcement staff at the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE), and served as a go-between with MDE to protect the worker's identity. MDE fumbled things a bit. As one inspector came to the site, they sat in the driveway for about 30 minutes while waiting for another MDE staffperson from a different program to join them. Meanwhile, workers noticed the MDE vehicle and the maintenance manager and other workers unplugged and hid the illegal pump and hose to hide the evidence.
Despite that enforcement blunder, this whisteblower's documentation formed the basis for the 2023 Settlement Agreement and Consent Order that resulted five criminal counts. The previous owner pleaded guilty and agreed to pay $132,500 -- one of the largest fines in an environmental criminal case in state history. Kenneth Jackson, former Director of Plant Operations was sentenced with two years of (suspended) incarceration with three years of probation.
The crimes and violations noted by inspectors involved illegal air and water discharges and incomplete burning of waste.
WATER: Workers were instructed to run a hose through the woods to discharge process water on a hillside on state highway property. They were illegally discharging untreated wastewater which had come in contact with untreated medical waste. Wastewater tanks were rotting and overflowing, leaking and going down the driveway. With no sewer connection on the property, they allowed stormwater to leak and be piped offsite to go into storm drains.
AIR: Highly toxic fly ash was blown around and vented. Incinerator emissions were allowed to bypass pollution controls and be emitted directly into the atmosphere.
WASTE: Medical waste would drop out of trucks often. Waste was fed more than the incinerators could handle and wasn't fully burned (108 times noted in a 6-month period in 2019-2020). Shipments of charred medical waste to a Virginia landfill were returned for not being completely incinerated, including substantial amounts of unburned combustible medical waste such as red waste bags, medical gloves, plastic pill bottles, paper, and biological material. Between Oct 2018 and Mar 2020, waste came out without being fully burned on at least 83 separate dates and there were four times where fires were noted on the ash pad where waste was still burning after leaving the incinerator. On 11/13/2019, a load of ash in transit to a Virginia landfill caught fire and burned through the metal transport container during transit. Other trucks, followed by state inspectors on multiple occasions, leaked fluid on the entire trip to the landfill and covered the agents' cars and windshields with an unknown substance.
The air and water discharge violations continued after the Oct 2023 consent order and the ongoing investigations, along with community reporting of black smoke events, became the basis for the March complaint six months later, and ultimately the 2026 Consent Decree.
To learn more about this from the state's own documents, see:
9/20/2023 Environmental Crimes Unit case against Curtis Bay Energy
https://web.archive.org/web/20240807173228/https://www.marylandattorneygeneral.gov/news%20documents/101723_State_v_Jackson.pdf
10/17/2023 Press release: "Attorney General Anthony Brown Announces Guilty Plea and Sentencing of Curtis Bay Energy, LP – Owner of Largest Medical Waste Incinerator in the United States"
https://news.maryland.gov/mde/2023/10/18/attorney-general-anthony-brown-announces-guilty-plea-and-sentencing-of-curtis-bay-energy-lp-owner-of-largest-medical-waste-incinerator-in-the-united-states/
Dec. 2023 Settlement Agreement and Consent Order
https://mde.maryland.gov/Documents/MDE%20LMA%20v%20Curtis%20Bay%20Energy%20Consent%20Order%20%28CBE%20Executed%29%20%282%29%20%281%29.pdf
3/14/2024 Press release: "Maryland Department of the Environment, Attorney General File Complaint in Circuit Court Against Curtis Bay Energy Medical Waste Incinerator for Air Pollution Violations"
https://news.maryland.gov/mde/2024/03/14/maryland-department-of-the-environment-attorney-general-file-complaint-in-circuit-court-against-curtis-bay-energy-medical-waste-incinerator-for-air-pollution-violations/
3/14/2024 Complaint filed
https://mde.maryland.gov/Documents/Complaint_filed_3-14-2024.pdf
9/30/2026 Consent Decree
https://mde.maryland.gov/Documents/MDE%20v%20CBE_OAG%20Approved%20Consent%20Decree_%209-30-2026_Executed.pdf
10/1/2026 Press release: "Attorney General Brown and Department of the Environment Reach Agreement with Curtis Bay Energy to End Incinerator Operations at South Baltimore Facility"
https://oag.maryland.gov/News/pages/Attorney-General-Brown-and-Department-of-the-Environment-Reach-Agreement-with-Curtis-Bay-Energy-to-End-Incinerator-Operatio.aspx
10/1/2026 Press release: "State Reaches Agreement with Curtis Bay Energy to End Incinerator Operations at South Baltimore Facility"
https://news.maryland.gov/mde/2026/10/01/state-reaches-agreement-with-curtis-bay-energy-to-end-incinerator-operations-at-south-baltimore-facility/
