Topics and Meetings

Upcoming Meetings

  • Next Meeting: Tuesday, April 28, 2026 - Tour of CPET Facility at San Jacinto College
  • The typical PCAC meeting agenda includes updates from plants on environmental and safety performance and business information. The main topic may be a presentation, an annual report, or a tour. Time is always allotted for Q&A and discussion. Plans for the next few meetings are reviewed and confirmed. Contact us at info@pasadenacac.org if you would like an invitation to join us.

Spotlight on...

Denise Ehrlich, Facility Manager at Gulf Coast Authority (GCA), explained that GCA provides centralized wastewater treatment services for industrial facilities along the Houston Ship Channel and some municipalities. She explained the role they play in protecting Texas waterways by treating some of the hardest to treat wastewaters, including:

  • Industrial wastewater from refineries, chemical plants, storage facilities
  • Municipal wastewater (including from the City of Pasadena)
  • Waste from portable toilets, septic tanks, washdown streams, and nonhazardous industrial sources

Ehrlich walked attendees through GCA’s biological treatment system, where microorganisms break down organic material in the wastewater. The water then goes through a settling and disinfection process, before the clear water is discharged into the Houston Ship Channel. Ehrlich emphasized that GCA’s mission is to protect water quality using environmentally sound, economically feasible, and technologically advanced wastewater solutions.

Meeting Summaries
Of Special Interest Over the Years
  • January 25, 2022--Plant Communication with the Community When Planning a Maintenance Turnaround. Summary.
  • December 2, 2021-- Effects of Pollution on Health. Summary  Slides
  • March 25, 2021-- Harris County's New Community Air Monitoring Program. Summary
  • January 26, 2021-- Pasadena Citizens’ Advisory Council’s 30th Anniversary.  Summary.  Slides.
  • September 22, 2020-- Recent and Upcoming Technology to Improve the Safety of Truck Transportation of Plant Raw Materials and Products. Summary  Speaker's Slides.  Hydroblasting Safety Initiative
  • April 28, 2020-- Chemical Industry Hurricane Preparedness.  Summary.  Speaker Slides
  • January 28, 2020-- Industry Impacts on the Community: Jobs, Community Relations Programs, and Taxes. Summary
  • December 5, 2019 -- Center for Petrochemical, Energy and Technology Tour. Summary
  • March 5, 2019 -- Joint CAC Meeting: Consequences of Regulatory Changes on the Economy and the Environment. Summary. Speaker Slides: Honeycutt, Craft, Beskid.
  • April 25, 2018 – Joint Meeting with Bay Area Community Advisory Panel to hear Dr. Sam Mannan on Ranking of Chemical Facilities Based on Potential to Cause Harm to the Public. Summary.
Safety Moments

At each meeting, plants report workplace-related worker injuries and illnesses recorded as required by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Occasionally, PCAC schedules plants to talk about their safety programs. Since 2010, the group has incorporated a Safety Moment into each meeting. Presented by a PCAC plant, the moment may be about safety specific to that plant or about preventing the kind of accidents common in everyday life.

Safety Tips

  • Credit card fraud is on the rise due to quickly evolving technology used to steal credit card information. The technological devices, which are becoming increasingly more available, are used to make ‘white plastic’ that appears to be a real credit card, but is just plastic used by scammers to hold stolen credit card information.

    Safety Moment: Fraud Protection

How We Select Meeting Topics

Every year or so, PCAC develops a Program Plan to assure it is addressing issues of greatest interest to community members.  Community members, plant members, and guests brainstorm topics they believe PCAC should address.  Using sticky dots, they choose those they most want to cover in the coming year.  By using different colors for community and plant members, PCAC is able to schedule the topics of most community interest. Members may also see whether there are differences in what community and plant members want to discuss.  The Program Plan is flexible and may be changed by group agreement.   Contact us at info@pasadenacac.org if there are issues you would like PCAC to address

Deer Park Community Advisory Council