NEW DELHI—A plastics factory in India where a chemical gas leak killed 12 people and sickened hundreds more last week lacked federal environmental clearance but had been issued state permits to operate anyway, exposing a potentially dangerous enforcement gap in the country’s laws.
The owner of the LG Polymers plant in Andhra Pradesh state, South Korean chemicals giant LG Chem, said in a May 2019 affidavit that formed part of an application for the clearance that the company “doesn’t have a valid environmental clearance substantiating the produced quantity, issued by the competent authority, for continuing operations.”
