GREETINGS TREMENDOUS TIDAL WAVE OF UNIFIED ACTION IN OPPOSITION TO RESYNERGI’S PLASTICS INCINERATION FACILITY!
We have arrived at a most wonderful point of celebration of our UNITY… OUR OPPOSITION WAS SUCCESSFUL, RESYNERGI IS LEAVING CALIFORNIA!
My heart overflows with deep wells of abundant gratitude for all we did, TOGETHER!
We came together, here on change.org, at city council meetings, reaching out to our elected officials, canvassing our neighborhoods, posting lawn signs, showing up to zoom meetings, picketing, tabling, sharing on socials, finding our voices, showing up, speaking out- over and over and over again!
WE rose up, pushed back and overcame formidable opponents! WE are the ones they never thought about or considered important. WE were purposefully kept in the dark, given only 30 days to voice OUR opposition to the Air Board- who had already voiced their likely support to permit Resynergi.
AND… OUR WAVE OF ACTIONS CHANGED THE TIDES!
WE were ENTIRELY outnumbered in EVERY direction. Somo Village/Resynergi had the previous 8 years of support from big industry money and the “powers that be” to build their novel plastics pyrolysis prototypes. Resynergi was not to build/operate until they obtained permits to do so from the Air Board and the City of Rohnert Park. Instead, this past year, the “powers that be” watched Resynergi build up their newest facility without permits and then encouraged the public to enter and tour Resynergi’s UNPERMITTED heavy industrial facility! Talk about being invited into the lion’s den for dinner…
THEN… WE HAPPENED! AND ONLY THEN DID THE TIDE BEGIN TO CHANGE!
The truth is in the timeline. WE are the TRUTH in this timeline! From December 18, 2024 – July 18, 2025 Resynergi built up their facility without the proper permitting to do so. After the July 18, 2025 public notice, WE showed up and spoke out! Then on August 6th and August 20th the Air Board and the City of Rohnert Park finally followed their own rules and issued Notices of Violations and a Stop Work Order to Resynergi. The violations were issued because WE started watching, WE researched the truth and WE insisted OUR health and safety be considered!
The truth is, Resynergi and the “powers that be” attempted to site a novel plastics pyrolysis incineration operation 500 feet from our children, in a neighborhood and thriving business park where that land use is prohibited by claiming it was a recycling facility and an innovative technology saving our planet (by making oil to make more plastic to save our planet from the plastic crisis).
The truth is, since 2017, OUR health, soil, air and water quality has been knowingly compromised by Resynergi with the “powers that be” watching. During this time period, WE were exposed to 11,500 hours of Resynergi’s unpermitted and unregulated plastics pyrolysis operations.
What are the “powers that be” planning to do about this egregious treatment of us citizens and to take responsibility for their role in this maltreatment? So far, the loudest thing I hear is a collective sigh of relief that Resynergi decided to up and move. MUCH MORE than a sigh of relief is required to ensure our public trust, health and safety will be protected by the “powers that be” going forward.
Even now, the maltreatment continues. WE are being signed up to go down in history as Resynergi’s successful R&D phase- little ‘ol Sonoma County California, they just simply outgrew us. Just check out Resynergi’s latest FAQs to see how easy it is for this company to bend the truth until it breaks***.
Let us be VERY CLEAR- WE DID NOT AND DO NOT CONSENT to being Resynergi’s novel technology Guinea pigs since 2017! WE REJECT Resynergi’s claims to have been successful here in Sonoma County and propose the opposite as true- they built their business in direct violations of the law and knowingly compromised our community’s health to do so. They made money and WE got mis-treated, used and lied to.
The City of Rohnert Park, County Department of Health Services, Zero Waste Sonoma, Bay Area Air District were on board with Somo Village/Resynergi building up to become our neighbor.
Then… WE HAPPENED. WE knew WE were being mis-treated and ignored. WE knew WE mattered! WE didn’t let them tell us our place. WE knew our worth and then WE told them, over and over and over! Relentless, caring, fierce, determined, united, strong.
WE dedicated ourselves to showing up + speaking out. WE shared in our dedication to demand OUR public health and safety! WE acted together to protect ourselves from the looming multi-million-dollar petrochemical industry looking to replace our environment’s quality with their toxic industry’s plastics pollution emissions.
LET US CELEBRATE the power of people to stand up with truth and honor!
LET US CELEBRATE a better tomorrow by how we live and treat each other today!
LET US ALL use less plastic each and every day… REDUCE our reliance on and use of plastic REPLACE plastic with non-toxic alternatives REJECT the concept that incinerating plastics will save our planet from our plastics crisis
There is cause for celebration at this moment for our community’s preserved and protected health!
There is also equal cause for each and every one of us to examine our complex and complicated relationship with plastics. Until we resist plastics in our own lives (this is neither easy nor simple), we will continue to live with the toxicity of plastics in our lives.
More attempts at plastics incineration will most likely be coming to California because we most likely will maintain and/or increase our plastic waste stream. Please stay in touch with our community’s efforts to maintain opposition to plastics incineration AND support reducing our plastics waste stream, visit www.rohnertparkincinerator.com and/or email environmentsoco.gmail.com
TOGETHER, keeping our eyes out for each other with the utmost care and commUNITY! WE were built up in this moment, TOGETHER… let us continue to work on being the solution to plastics pollution on Earth, TOGETHER!
Deeply Grateful for YOU,
Stephanie Lennox**
* The Air Board is mandated to follow California's Health and Safety Code § 42301.6- air pollution control districts must notify schools and residents within 1,000 feet of a proposed new or modified stationary source of air pollution that emits toxic substances.
** It was said that our “opposition was well funded”. I belly laughed when I heard that the first time…. Just one example, it cost me $55 to print/bind the 5,000+ signatures to deliver to the city of Rohnert Park. If someone knows where those well-funded pockets are to get reimbursed, please let me know!
KPFA Flashpoints exclusive interview on our opposition efforts. Please consider supporting KPFA’s excellent Flashpoints programming, an award winning front-line investigative news magazine focusing on human, civil and workers rights, issues of war and peace, Global Warming, racism and poverty, and other issues. Hosted by Dennis J. Bernstein A Special Report on A Bay Area Start Up Testing For a Plastics Incineration Facility. https://kpfa.org/episode/flashpoints-september-24-2025/
Recent article on our opposition’s effectiveness:
Great Resources to continue building confidence in countering plastics incineration claims at being a good idea/technology/way to save the planet from plastics (aka their greenwashing):
https://just-zero.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/2022-12-14-Just-Zero-Advanced-Recycling-Report.pdf
Excellent article (published before resynergi closed), by a Credo High School student in Community Voice https://www.thecommunityvoice.com/community/parents-continue-to-protest-novel-plastic-processing-next-to-credo-high-school/article_95f93149-b254-43fa-82fb-7e536704cf59.html
*** One Q and A from Resynergi’s newly revised FAQs (go to their main webpage to read them all)
How will you address concerns that you were “driven out” of Rohnert Park? We understand the perception, but it’s not accurate. Our Rohnert Park chapter was a success story — a vital R&D incubation phase that gave us the foundation to expand. The move is about scaling responsibly, not retreating.
Turns out, WE have the final word!