Air

Tracking the latest agency and congressional debates over rules to cut emissions of traditional pollutants, and a broad range of novel EPA policies including the agency's shift to a "multipollutant" regulatory approach for individual sectors.

Topic Subtitle
Tracking the latest agency and congressional debates over rules to cut emissions of traditional pollutants, and a broad range of novel EPA policies including the agency's shift to a "multipollutant" regulatory approach for individual sectors.

Expanding Good Neighbor Stay, EPA Eyes Extra Time For Compliance

EPA is expanding its stay of the Good Neighbor Plan (GNP) rule to six more states where courts have effectively stayed the rule’s application, and is suggesting it will provide more time for states and industry to implement the rule’s interstate ozone control mandates should judicial stays be lifted -- a blow to environmentalists seeking swift compliance. In an interim final rule scheduled for publication in the Federal Register Sept. 29, EPA stays the Good Neighbor rule in Alabama,...

Environmentalists sue EPA over SIP inaction

Environmental group Our Children’s Earth Foundation (OCE) is suing EPA over its failure to act within statutory deadlines on dozens of state implementation plan (SIP) modifications for attaining federal air quality standards, submitted by Southern and Western states over decades. In one lawsuit filed Sept. 26 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, OCE asks the court to set binding deadlines on EPA to approve or disapprove SIP submissions from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, South Carolina and...

Uhlmann Orders OECA To Include Climate In Host Of Enforcement Actions

EPA’s enforcement chief is directing officials to prioritize including climate mitigation and adaptation elements throughout the agency’s enforcement actions, arguing this would take important steps to reduce greenhouse gases that cause climate change and boost resilience to climate-linked disasters. “To meet the urgency of this moment, I am requiring that EPA’s enforcement and compliance program: (1) prioritize enforcement and compliance actions to mitigate climate change; (2) include climate adaptation and resilience in case conclusions whenever appropriate,” Office of Enforcement &...

Industry, Environmentalists Spar Over EPA’s Air Rule For Copper Smelters

Industry groups are protesting EPA’s proposed tougher air toxics rules for copper smelters, claiming they breach agency policy on cost-effectiveness, with substantial costs and no “meaningful” health benefit, while environmentalists are pressing the agency to instead tighten the plan further to reduce “glaring environmental injustices.” EPA took public comment through Sept. 22 on its July 24 supplemental proposal that adds further emissions limits to an initial proposal released in January 2022, which tightens limits pursuant to a Clean Air Act-mandated...

Environmentalists Urge EPA To Toughen Air Toxics Plant Classification Rule

Environmentalists are urging EPA to toughen its proposed rule governing how industrial facilities are classified for regulating air toxics, charging the agency’s proposal does not go far enough in limiting emissions after officials sought to preserve a Trump-era policy that allows facilities to downgrade their regulatory status while adding new permit ‘safeguards.’ “This rule allows industry backsliding on dangerous air toxic pollutants and does not do enough to reverse the Trump rollback of important protections which have been in place...

D.C. Circuit Declines To Stay Good Neighbor Rule, Opening High Court Path

Correction Appended A divided three-judge appellate panel in Washington, D.C., has rejected industry and states’ push to stay EPA’s Good Neighbor Plan air rule, preserving hope for the embattled interstate program, but opening splits with regional appeals courts that could point toward a return to the Supreme Court on the issue even before the lower courts rule on the merits. In a brief Sept. 25 per curium order , two judges on the of the U.S. Court of...

EPA Floats Final RMP Overhaul, Setting Stage For Tough Safety Mandates

EPA has sent its final rule overhauling the risk management program (RMP) to the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for interagency review, setting the stage for what is expected to be a slew of changes to facility-safety requirements addressing emergency preparedness, regulatory definitions and extreme weather planning, among others. OMB received the rule late on Sept. 25, signaling that EPA has finished its own work on a final action but teeing up the interagency process and a...

EPA Sends Updated PFAS Destruction Guide For White House Review

EPA has sent an updated version of its interim guidance on the destruction and disposal of PFAS for White House interagency review, a measure that many observers say could determine what technologies are considered safe and effective for addressing the widespread contamination stemming from the chemicals. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) received the agency’s “Interim Guidance on the Destruction and Disposal of Perfluoroalkyl and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances [PFAS] and Materials Containing Perfluoroalkyl and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances; Version II” on Sept...

EPA Defends Definition Of ‘New’ Boilers In Latest MACT Rule Litigation

EPA is defending its decision to maintain a 2010 cut-off date for boilers designated as “new” for the purposes of compliance with strict new air toxics standards in the face of an industry push to set a later date, while also rejecting environmental groups’ advocacy for the agency to use more-recent data to set limits. In its Sept. 18 opening brief in U.S. Sugar Corp. v. EPA , now pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of...

Biden Officials Seek To Prod GHG Cuts From Various Industrial Sectors

The Biden administration is highlighting the potential industrial-sector greenhouse gas cuts achievable over the next several years using strategies that have “net positive economics,” even as it is flagging the need to address a suite of hurdles to adopting such options. The broad industrial sector is a “significant contributor” to national GHG emissions, representing 23 percent of emissions in 2021, according to a Sept. 18 Energy Department (DOE) report about how various GHG-reduction strategies in the sector can achieve commercial...

EPA Floats New ‘Safeguards’ In Revised ‘Once In, Always In’ Air Toxics Rule

EPA is proposing to adopt a revised version of its longstanding “once in, always in” (OIAI) air toxics control policy, preserving a Trump-era option that had allowed facilities to reclassify from strictly regulated “major sources” to lesser-regulated “area sources,” though with new provisions giving states power to craft and enforce new permit “safeguards” that aim to prevent any emissions increases. “Today, EPA is proposing additional safeguards to address emissions of hazardous air pollutants from major industrial sources,” said Joe Goffman,...

States’ Suit Seeks Wood Heater NSPS Review As Tougher PM Limits Loom

States led by New York are suing EPA to force a review of new source performance standards (NSPS) for residential wood heaters, amid concern about weak testing that allows sales of heaters that do not meet current emissions limits and would undercut attainment of the agency’s looming strengthening of fine particulate (PM2.5) standards. In their suit filed Sept. 21 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Alaska, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Vermont...

Oil & Gas Groups Seek Compliance Deadline Extension For Methane Rule

Oil and gas groups are bolstering their pitch for EPA to significantly delay the deadline for complying with the agency’s forthcoming methane standards for new equipment in the sector, citing an industry survey finding supply chain constraints for a range of equipment needed to achieve the requirements. The pitch builds on more general comments submitted in February on EPA’s supplemental proposal, in which the American Petroleum Institute (API) flagged supply chain challenges as one of numerous concerns with the plan,...

SAB Seeks To Soften Workgroup’s Criticism Of Ethanol’s Climate Impact

EPA’s Science Advisory Board (SAB) is seeking to soften language in a draft workgroup “commentary” that suggested corn ethanol fails to achieve greenhouse gas cuts compared with regular gasoline, a claim that has sparked significant debate between biofuels and environmental groups over the fuels’ benefits. During a Sept. 21 meeting, the Chartered SAB suggested the workgroup temper its suggestion that ethanol fails to achieve GHG cuts by adding contrasting language reflecting studies showing emissions reductions. Steven Hamburg, a member of...

EPA Plan Fails To Resolve OIG Calls To Improve Ports’ Emissions Monitoring

EPA is agreeing to recommendations from its Office of Inspector General (OIG) to assess and enhance air monitoring around ports and in near-port communities and set performance measures for its Ports Initiative, but the agency’s proposed corrective actions for its Ports Initiative falls short by failing to set defined objectives. OIG issued a Sept. 21 report highlighting the need for EPA to track changes in air emissions in near-port communities and develop guidance for using community group air-monitoring data. The...

First-Time TRI Data Ups Pressure On EPA To Cut Gas Processors’ Air Toxics

First-time Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) data submitted to EPA by natural gas processing stations shows large emissions of carcinogenic air toxics, but environmentalists say the numbers significantly underestimate the problem, as pressure mounts on the agency to tighten rules for the sector, which is expected to grow as gas exports ramp up. According to a Sept. 6 analysis of EPA’s data compiled by the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP), 258 plants reported releasing a combined total of 3.2 million pounds of...

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