On the east side, concrete does not stay concrete for long. Demolition trucks haul broken slabs to yards along Wallisville Road. Machines smash them into rock that goes back out as base for roads, fill for lots, and gravel for landscaping. That loop keeps tons of material out of landfills. It also puts particle dust into the air of a corridor where industry, shops, and houses already sit close together.
E Z Waste, Inc., owned by Bernard Gonzalez, is asking the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), the state environmental agency, for Air Quality Permit 182699. The application would authorize a permanent crushing plant about a tenth of a mile north of Wallisville and Zaballos Court in Houston’s 77013 ZIP. The company describes itself as a family-owned recycler working that corridor since the mid-2000s. Its plain-language summary says water sprays at crushers, screens, and transfer points would cut emissions at material inlets and outlets by 70 percent. In 2024, City Council also granted E. Z. Waste a separate 10-year franchise to haul commercial solid waste on Houston streets. That franchise is not the air permit. It does show the firm is already woven into the city’s waste economy.
The draft special conditions sketch a large yard. Crushing would be capped at 200 tons per hour and 460,000 tons per year. Operations could run up to 10 hours a day, six days a week, but not between 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. (stockpiles excepted). Stockpiles would stop at 45 feet. Visible dust would not be allowed to leave the property for more than 30 seconds in any six-minute stretch. TCEQ has finished its technical review, prepared a draft permit, and made a preliminary decision to issue. State modeling staff found the applicant’s air analysis acceptable against federal particle standards, using background readings from the Clinton Drive monitor.
That does not mean the permit is already final. A preliminary lean is a draft leaning yes, not a signed approval. The public meeting and written comments still go on the official record, and the agency has to answer formal comments in writing before it can finish the decision. So neighbors can still act. The Thursday, October 22 night is that chance. Details for the meeting and how to put comments on the record live in this issue’s Events write-up: Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) public meeting: E Z Waste concrete crusher (Oct 22).
Why would dust from a crusher matter to the people next door? The draft papers list two kinds of particle pollution the plant would put out, PM10 and PM2.5: tiny bits of dust and other matter. The company’s summary puts the yearly total at about 0.46 tons of PM10 and about 0.06 tons of PM2.5. The EPA says particles under 10 micrometers can get deep into the lungs, and exposure has been linked to aggravated asthma, decreased lung function, heart problems, and premature death in people who already have heart or lung disease. Children and older adults are among those most likely to be affected. That is why the location matters: a TCEQ site review notes JW Oates Elementary roughly a third of a mile from the unit. The open question for neighbors is whether the water sprays and dust limits in the draft will hold up once the yard is running every day.
City Council does not approve or deny this air permit. That decision stays with TCEQ. Your District I office can still help neighbors be heard. If the plant is operating later and dust or odor is a problem, call 311 or Houston Pollution Control.
So the story on Wallisville is not a cartoon of villains and heroes. It is a recycler with a draft leaning yes, a neighborhood living next to the machines that feed Houston’s rebuild, and a public night still on the calendar before the decision is final.
