Environmentalists’ Lawsuit Challenges EPA’s Ozone ‘Interprecursor Trading’

Environmentalists are challenging EPA’s regulations allowing industrial pollution sources to trade in different ozone precursor chemicals, a facet of the agency’s efforts to ease implementation of federal ozone standards but which environmental groups claim undermines necessary emission reductions. Under the EPA rules, “a source can offset increased emissions of one precursor with fewer emissions of the other--thus abrogating the [Clean Air Act’s] express requirement that offsets must consist of ‘an equal or greater reduction . . . in actual emissions,’”...