The paper discusses the effect of oil shale recovery processes on air emissions. In developing the analysis for this process comparison, the EPA's Pollution Control Technical Manuals (PCTMs) for various oil shale processes and various PSD Permit Applications were used. The PCTMs present a comprehensive analysis of the heat and material flows in a complete oil shale recovery process. The PSD applications provide controlled air emissions for the specific process considered by the developer. This, the comparison presented in the paper is based on the actual design conditions expected in a full-scale operation. The basic conclusion derived from the analysis is that, although the air emission levels for the different retort processes with controls considered to be Best Available Control Technology (BACT) can vary considerably, sometimes by as much as two orders of magnitude, the application of control techniques that are either improvements over existing technology or more suitable for a specific application, results in similar emission levels for all five processes considered.