Indiana - In Deal, BP Will Install Pollution Controls at Oil Refinery - NYTimes.com BP said Wednesday that it would spend $400 million to install pollution controls at its giant Whiting, Ind., refinery to allow it to process heavy crude oil from Canada, in a deal with federal and state regulators. The consent decree reached with the Justice Department and Environmental Protection Agency also requires BP, based in London, to pay $8 million to resolve prior claims of clean-air violations at the plant, the sixth-largest American refinery. The deal ends years of opposition that might have left BP unable to use $4 billion worth of new processing units being installed at Whiting that will allow it to run Canadian tar sands crude as early as next year. Midwest refiners have looked to bolster their profits by refitting to process plentiful supplies of Canadian heavy oil, which is cheaper and has a higher content of pollutants that cause acid rain, smog and haze. The Natural Resources Defense Council, which opposed BP's crude slate expansion, said the new pollution equipment would cut emissions from the refinery's flare system by 90 percent.