Above: Dow/Union Carbide “Seadrift Operations” plastic and petrochemical complex in Seadrift, Texas. Photo by Diane Wilson
Update 3/27: Diane Wilson Released and Public Meeting Announced
Diane Wilson was released from jail early on Friday, March 27, 2026. Wilson continues her hunger strike, calling on Dow to stop polluting plastic pellets from the Seadrift facility and withdraw their permit application to build four new nuclear reactors at the site.
In a separate protest on March 26, Wilson’s colleague and San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper (SABEW) organizer Dan Lê interrupted Dow CEO Jim Fitterling during a keynote speech at an oil and gas conference in Houston, asking why he had not responded to Wilson’s letter. Lê was arrested that day and has since been released. Dow has not offered a response to SABEW’s demand letter.
Following more than 200 requests, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has announced it will hold a public meeting on Dow’s wastewater permit application—a request to authorize uncontrolled microplastics and plastic chemical discharges into waterways that flow into San Antonio Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. These waters provide habitat for endangered species such as the Kemp’s ridley sea turtle and the whooping crane, while also supporting local fishing economies.
Dow’s application is currently under technical review, and the meeting will be scheduled once a draft permit is released. Records of activity related to the permit is available here.
Return to this blog for further updates as this story develops.
Update 3/26: Diane Wilson Arrested After Peaceful Attempt to Deliver Letter on Day 25 of Hunger Strike
On day 25 of Diane Wilson’s hunger strike, Wilson was arrested after attempting to deliver a demand letter to Dow Chemical. This was Wilson’s second attempt to deliver the letter in person to the site director to then forward the letter to Dow CEO Jim Fitterling. After refusing to leave the property until the letter could be received, sheriff’s officers arrived to arrest her.
Wilson initiated her hunger strike on March 2, with the demands for Dow to commit to zero discharge of plastic pellets, powder, and flakes from its Seadrift facility and to withdraw all plans to build four experimental nuclear reactors at the site. Wilson says she will not end her strike until all her demands are met, planning to continue her hunger strike from the Calhoun County jail. Read more here.
Update 3/10: Diane Wilson Makes Demands
As Diane Wilson entered the second week of her hunger strike, she and members of San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper attempted to deliver a formal demand letter to the facility’s site director to forward to Dow CEO Jim Fitterling. When San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper requested delivery to a senior official, Dow’s head of security, John Weitz, offered to “handle” the letter himself, ordered them to stop video recording, told them they were on private property, and said that Wilson specifically would be arrested if she set foot on Dow property, citing her history of a 2002 action at the facility, in which she scaled an 80-foot chemical tower to unfurl a banner regarding the Bhopal disaster.
Shortly after, Calhoun County sheriff’s officers arrived and presented Diane and a San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper member with a formal order to sign, bearing Weitz’s name, stating that they would be arrested if found on Dow property. When San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper requested a copy of the order they had been asked to sign, they were told they could not have one. The letter is being sent directly to Fitterling at Dow’s headquarters in Midland, Michigan.
The demand letter makes two requests: that Dow commit to zero discharge of plastic pellets, powder, and flakes from its Seadrift facility and incorporate that commitment into its operating permit; and that Dow cancel all plans to build four experimental nuclear reactors at the site and withdraw its construction permit application from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Wilson says she will not end her strike until both demands are met.
Diane Wilson, Goldman Prize-winning activist and fourth-generation fisherwoman, initiated a hunger strike on March 2, 2026, demanding action in response to Dow’s recent request to the State of Texas to legalize its discharge of microplastics and plan to build four experimental nuclear reactors. Wilson is camping out 24 hours a day in a ditch in front of Dow’s Seadrift complex.
Facing multiple lawsuits over its pollution, Dow has made an unprecedented request to legalize the discharge of plastic pellets called “nurdles” from its massive plastics and petrochemical complex in Seadrift, Texas, into waters that feed San Antonio Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. If Dow’s permit to discharge is approved, the decision could set a precedent for legalizing discharges of microplastics and plastic chemicals from other plastics and petrochemical manufacturing facilities.
Diane Wilson is a lifelong resident of Seadrift, Texas, and also serves as San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper’s Executive Director. She and other boaters have spent years collecting thousands of samples of evidence of Dow and other plastic producers’ continual plastic pollution in industrial canals and waterways outside of their facilities. In 2019, Wilson and San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper won a landmark $50 million Clean Water Act settlement after suing Formosa Plastics in nearby Point Comfort—another major plastic producing facility—for its pollution in Lavaca/Matagorda Bay and other Texas waterways. San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper provided more than 2,000 samples of microplastic pollution collected from industrial canals and these local waterways as evidence in court.
For decades, plastic pellets called ‘nurdles’ have been flowing from this plant into our waterways—ending up in our bay, on our shorelines, and in the fish, birds, and oysters that call these waters home. Their wastewater permit is clear: no floating solids except trace amounts. And what have our Waterkeepers documented? Hundreds of thousands of pellets. In one sample taken on New Years Eve, 2025, I collected 107 pounds of plastic pellets in one spot. In nurdle terms, that’s over 2 million pellets. That’s not ‘trace amounts.’ That’s reckless disregard. That’s ‘We don’t care.’
That is why I am so enraged by the cavalier and unspeakable reckless language in Dow’s new wastewater permit. They are saying ‘trace amounts’ for ‘floating solids’ (pellets) is vague and too stringent. They want something more and the language is forthcoming. Basically, Dow is asking Texas to legalize plastic pollution from its Seadrift facility.
— Diane Wilson
Decision Could Mean Permission to Pollute
Dow operates in Seadrift as its subsidiary Union Carbide Corporation to produce various types of plastics as well as fossil fuel-derived industrial chemicals commonly used in antifreeze and coolants, detergents, paints, and other products. The company requested an amendment to its wastewater permit in a 320-page application filed January 4, 2026. It explicitly requests “a change to the language requiring no discharge of floating solids other than trace amounts.” Before plastics are melted into products, they are manufactured into pellets (nurdles), powders, flakes, and foam.
Even with standing prohibitions on anything more than “trace” discharge of plastics and plastic chemicals under the Federal Clean Water Act, plastic facilities commonly discharge these substances into local waterways along with their industrial wastewater. Officially allowing such discharge in the State of Texas would create a pathway for taking the teeth out of existing pollution regulations on facilities producing plastics and petrochemicals, granting corporations permission to pollute microplastics and plastic chemicals.
Longstanding Evidence of Pollution
In December 2025, San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper filed a legal notice of intent to sue Dow for alleged large-scale discharges of plastic pellets, powders, flakes, and foam from its 4,700-acre petrochemical complex outside Seadrift, Texas. Then, 58 days after Waterkeeper filed its 60-day notice of intent to sue Dow, in February the office of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit alleging “habitual” water pollution violations at Dow’s Seadrift complex.
Though the State of Texas’ lawsuit references hundreds of documented violations at the Dow complex, its filing hindered Waterkeeper from filing its own suit. That’s because, while individuals, communities, and organizations can sue for pollution violations under the Clean Water Act, they may only do so when regulators—such as state entities—have not intervened to address documented violations. Texas’ lawsuit appears to follow a pattern in which state officials sue polluters only to later negotiate modest settlements in order to prevent more aggressive litigation from individuals, communities, and organizations like Waterkeeper.
Take Action
A public comment period is currently open on Dow’s application to amend its wastewater permit. Afterwards, it is expected to be voted on by three state commissioners who were appointed by Governor Greg Abbott. According to Inside Climate News, “Dow gave $20,000 to Abbott’s two inaugural committees, and Dow’s PAC gave $5,000 to Abbott’s 2026 reelection campaign and $20,000 to other Republican candidates in October.”
If you are living in Texas, you can help by requesting a public meeting on Dow’s permit. Please fill out the form at this link.
Follow and support the work of San Antonio Bay Estuarine Waterkeeper for updates here.
