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.

EPA poised to issue EtO sterilizers proposal

EPA is poised to release its proposal to tighten air toxics standards for commercial sterilizers and fumigation operations using the solvent ethylene oxide (EtO), after White House officials completed review of the regulation that will rely on a 2016 risk assessment finding EtO much more harmful than previously thought. The proposal cleared review by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) March 23, according to OMB’s website, allowing for publication in the Federal Register soon. EPA will...

House GOP Moves Toward Floor Action On Permit Bill, Amid Hill Splits

Republicans are moving to debate on the House floor their legislative package that would streamline and relax a host of EPA permit and other environmental requirements for “critical energy resources” and energy projects, even as sharp partisan divisions remain on the issue and the GOP works to smooth its own splits on the measure. The House Rules Committee has scheduled a March 27 hearing on H.R. 1, a compilation of proposals from multiple House committees dubbed the Lower Energy Costs...

CARB Moves To Speed Truck NOx Rule Fixes As Imminent EPA Waiver Stalls

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) has quietly approved a resolution giving Executive Officer Steve Cliff the authority to quickly relax the board’s heavy truck low-nitrogen oxide (NOx) “omnibus” standards for model years 2024-26, changes the board is making to address industry concerns while asking EPA to delay its imminent decision waiving federal preemption while it amends the rules. The March 23 CARB action seeks to expedite the regulatory changes rather than conducting a formal rulemaking process, which may indicate...

CASAC sets dates for ozone, NOx-SOx meetings

EPA has announced additional meetings for its Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) panels on ozone standards and nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur oxides (SOx) and particulate matter (PM) limits to debate agency staff’s suggestion to retain existing ozone limits, as well as forthcoming advice on NOx, SOx and PM ‘secondary’ limits. The ozone special panel will meet May 23 and 24, alongside the chartered seven-member CASAC, to determine its position on EPA staff’s revised draft policy assessment (PA) document, according...

EPA Eases ‘Contingency Measures’ For States Failing To Meet NAAQS

EPA in a just-issued draft guidance is easing mandates for states to impose “contingency measures” (CMs) in areas failing to make sufficient progress in meeting federal air quality standards, a development that may help areas in California and elsewhere that struggle with high pollution levels and have few options to take extra steps to curb them. According to the March 17 draft guidance , EPA is planning to ease several steps and measures it has previously used to assess the...

OMB Reviews Power Plant GHG Rules Amid Debate On EPA Authority

The White House has formally begun reviewing EPA’s latest set of draft greenhouse gas standards for power plants, signaling that officials are in the final stages of preparing the package even as EPA and GOP lawmakers are already engaged in a high-profile debate about the agency’s role in curbing utilities’ climate-warming emissions. The rules -- being developed under section 111 of the Clean Air Act -- will be EPA’s third attempt to craft GHG standards for existing power plants following...

Draft Guidance

Federal Register Notice


Automakers Defend EPA’s Vehicle GHG Rule In Face Of Legal Challenge

Auto manufacturers are defending EPA’s vehicle greenhouse gas standards from GOP and fuel industry claims that they violate the major questions doctrine, arguing the rules are a routine application of agency authority even though the standards will effectively require higher levels of electric vehicle (EV) adoption. “Rather than being a novel power grab the Final Rule hews closely to the model EPA has used for decades,” the Alliance for Automotive Innovation says in a March 21 brief in litigation over...

EPA Defends Trump-Era ‘Alternative’ Utah Haze Plan, Denies CSAPR Impact

The Biden EPA is defending the agency’s Trump-era approval of an “alternative” regional haze plan for Utah, which counts emissions cuts from a now-shuttered power plant in lieu of stringent controls it earlier favored, in a dispute with environmental groups that oppose the alternative as too weak. The agency’s lawyers also told judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit during March 21 oral arguments that its expanded Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR), which will now apply...

EPA announces CASAC lead NAAQS meetings

EPA has announced a series of meetings of the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) special panel reviewing national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for lead, ahead of the anticipated release of a new science assessment to support the ongoing review that may include a wider focus sought by the science advisers. In a Federal Register notice scheduled for publication March 22, EPA announces that the CASAC special panel will receive a virtual briefing April 11 from agency staff...

Biofuels, Oil Groups Clash Over EPA Plan To Allow Summertime E15 Sales

Biofuels industry and oil sector groups are clashing over EPA’s plan to allow eight Midwestern states to sell 15 percent ethanol fuel (E15) during the summer ozone season, with biofuels advocates criticizing EPA’s implementation delay to 2024 while some in the refining sector are pressing for a further extension to allow for infrastructure changes. At a March 21 virtual public hearing, several biofuels groups again pressed their case that EPA could, and should, approve requests from eight governors to modify...

DOJ Opposes GOP States’ Supplemental Standing Claims In Auto Case

The Justice Department (DOJ) and a California-led state coalition are opposing a bid by GOP-led states to supplement their claims that they have standing to challenge EPA’s preemption waiver for California’s auto emissions rules, arguing the GOP states have failed to prove economic harm from the policy. Further, DOJ and the California coalition say the procedural window has closed for Republican states to supplement their arguments on the threshold issue of standing. The battle surfaces late in the briefing stage...

Detailed EPA FY24 Request Seeks New Staff, Funding To Tackle Climate

The Biden administration’s fiscal year 2024 budget request seeks several increases in EPA staffing and other resources to address climate change, as part of a broader effort to bolster core agency activities, according to the agency’s newly released detailed description of the proposal. The agency’s Congressional Justification for its FY24 plan comes as Republican control of the House means an uphill fight for the proposal calling for EPA to rebuild its core capacity for administering multiple programs, beyond a suite...

Exxon Renews Strict Standing Theory As 5th Circuit Weighs Key Citizen Suit

ExxonMobil is arguing for a strict theory of standing in Clean Air Act citizen enforcement suits that would require plaintiffs to prove causation by the oil company of all their alleged injuries in order to establish standing, in a test of Supreme Court precedent on the issue that could result in severe constraints on citizen suits. In a March 20 supplemental brief filed in its en banc appeal of Environment Texas Citizen Lobby, Inc. v. ExxonMobil Corp. , the company...

EPA Seeks Preliminary Injunction To Force Denka To Reduce Chloroprene

EPA is stepping up its novel efforts to force Denka Performance Elastomer LLC to reduce chloroprene emissions from its Louisiana plant using rarely used Clean Air Act section 303 emergency power, filing a preliminary injunction motion that seeks to require the company to immediately and significantly reduce its emissions of the “likely” carcinogen. The Justice Department (DOJ), on behalf of EPA, filed a March 20 motion in United States v. Denka, et al., that argues the injunction is justified...

EPA Fights Regional Suits On State Air Plan Denials In Bid To Protect CSAPR

Seeking to protect the legal basis of the newly expanded Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR), EPA is fighting a growing number of suits in regional appeals courts targeting the agency’s rejection of many states’ interstate air plans, arguing the litigation belongs only in the District of Columbia Circuit, as more states sue to overturn the plan denials. The Feb. 13 EPA rule denying the “good neighbor” state implementation plans (SIPs) of 19 states outright, and a further two states in...

EPA Faces Late Pushback As California Truck Waiver Decision Nears

EPA is facing 11th-hour industry pushback over state emissions rules for heavy trucks, as the agency is poised to act on California requests for preemption waivers allowing it to enforce standards for criteria pollutants and greenhouse gases, amid signs that California officials are weighing steps to blunt at least some of the concerns. The flurry of activity comes as several sources expect EPA to issue the waivers as soon as the week of March 20, though the agency is remaining...

EPA Provides CSAPR Exemptions, Flexibility For Manufacturing Industries

EPA’s expanded Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) makes several concessions to manufacturing and industries newly regulated under the interstate air program, dropping some emissions limits outright and creating exemptions from others, but the rule otherwise keeps limits largely as proposed, and, in a departure from the proposal, also regulates incinerators. The rule unveiled March 15 imposes nitrogen-oxides (NOx) emissions rate limits starting in 2026 on nine industry sectors in 20 states but keeps the industries out of the broader CSAPR...

Attorney, States Seek EPA Clarification On EJ Requirements For CCS

A former EPA attorney is urging the agency and state regulators to more clearly outline the scope of environmental justice (EJ) analyses needed to issue permits for carbon storage projects, with EJ emerging as a central sticking point amid the Biden administration’s push to deploy the technology to reach climate goals. “I think everyone needs more guidance from EPA and from state regulators as to the scope of EJ analysis that has to be conducted and whether it needs to...

EPA Offers CSAPR Flexibility To Ease Reliability Concerns But Doubts Fears

EPA in its just-released rule expanding and tightening the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) interstate air emissions program is taking a series of steps to ease fears that power plant retirements spurred by the regulation could harm electric grid reliability -- even as EPA insists the emissions trading program does not threaten reliability. Among other things, EPA in the final rule delays some new nitrogen oxides (NOx) control requirements, commits to temporarily maintain a larger bank of NOx allowances to...

Pages

Not a subscriber? Sign up for 30 days free access to exclusive environmental policy reporting.