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.

Environmentalists threaten suit against Shell polymers plant

Environmental groups are threatening oil company Shell with a Clean Air Act citizen enforcement suit over excess air emissions from the firm’s new Monaca, PA, polymers plant, according to a notice sent to the company. In a Feb. 2 letter to Shell Chemical Appalachia, LLC, the operator of the Shell Polymers Monaca Site in Beaver County, PA, Clean Air Council and Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) give 60 days’ notice of their intent to sue the company in the U.S. District...

Seeking To Limit Precedent, EPA Fights Refiner’s Bid To Stay RFS Mandates

EPA and biofuels-sector groups are fighting a Montana refiner’s bid to stay its renewable fuel standard (RFS) compliance obligations pending resolution of its challenge to EPA’s denial of RFS hardship waivers, as refiners seek to expand the precedent set by a regional appeals court that earlier granted such a stay, threatening EPA’s waiver policy. Calumet Montana Refining, LLC, is looking to emulate the success of another Calumet facility, Calumet Shreveport, in winning a stay in the U.S. Court of Appeals...

Environmentalists Fear EPA Model, Peer Review Reinforce ‘Incineration Bias’

Environmentalists who are pressing EPA to toughen its incinerator air rules are raising concerns over the agency’s model used to calculate their emissions as well as the agency’s ongoing peer review, saying the model does not adequately address the units’ pollution and the peer review is not fully transparent as it does not allow for stakeholder input. During a Feb. 2 environmental justice (EJ) engagement session on EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management’s (OLEM) EJ action plan, Mike Ewall,...

EPA Faces Competing Input On How To Implement IRA Grant Programs

EPA is facing competing input on how it should structure key grant programs intended to address climate change and environmental justice (EJ) under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), with industry and labor pressing to ensure fossil fuels have a role, environmentalists opposing that approach and states urging officials to weigh the law’s impacts in context with their other responsibilities and EPA’s focus on civil rights. For example, environmentalists tell EPA in response to its requests for information (RFI) on six...

Denver Touts EPA’s SIP Disapproval In Push For Broader State EJ Analysis

Citing EPA’s recent disapproval of a California air quality plan on equity grounds, the city of Denver and allied groups are pressing EPA to require environmental justice (EJ) and civil rights analysis in all Colorado air plans, expanding calls for such requirements as the agency drafts guidance to states on how to factor such issues into their plans. In joint comments filed late last year , the city and county of Denver, along with other local municipalities and environmentalists, say...

EPA fighting Wyoming refiner’s bid to reinstate RFS credits

EPA is fighting a lawsuit filed by Sinclair Wyoming Refining aimed at forcing the agency to reinstate renewable fuel standard (RFS) compliance credits for 2018, which the company says EPA must return after wrongly denying Sinclair an RFS waiver. But the agency says the firm fails to challenge any judicially reviewable “final agency action.” In its lawsuit filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in May, Sinclair says EPA has arbitrarily denied the company the same...

Truck NOx Rule Flexibility Spurs Fears Amid Unclear Litigation Outlook

EPA’s publication of its strengthened heavy truck emissions standards is raising questions about whether states or environmental groups might challenge parts of the rule in court or urge the agency to reconsider them, after officials included an industry-friendly provision easing requirements during certain low temperature periods. The compliance flexibility could allow per-vehicle nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions in some conditions about 60 percent higher than California’s truck rules, critics fear, sparking concern that EPA’s standards could allow an improperly high contribution...

EPA Targets Power Sector But Environmentalists Fret Over Rules’ Timing

Environmentalists are increasingly concerned that EPA may slip further behind schedule in issuing key rules limiting air, water and other conventional releases from coal-fired power plants, as pressure builds to promulgate major regulations for the sector amid fears that EPA and the White House might lack the capacity to stay on track. “The Biden Administration has a long to-do list of critical rules for clean air, health and environmental justice, and they urgently need to pick up the pace,” one...

Governor Appoints New CARB Members As Terms For Four Veterans Expire

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is appointing four new members to the state air board to replace four long-time members whose terms have expired, while also reappointing two current members on the panel to six-year stints. On Jan. 30, the governor’s office announced the appointments of Eric Guerra, V. Manuel Perez, Bill Quirk and Susan Shaheen to the California Air Resources Board (CARB). The appointments require eventual state Senate confirmation. Guerra is vice mayor of Sacramento and has served as...

CARB, EJ Groups Ask Court To Decide On SIP ‘Contingency Measure’ Rules

California air board officials are battling with environmental justice (EJ) groups over when, and to what extent, regulators must include special “contingency measures” in a state implementation plan (SIP) to meet federal air quality standards as they seek a ruling on competing summary judgment motions on the issue from a federal district court. The litigation’s outcome is crucial as EJ groups are currently pushing the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and EPA to include such contingency measures in pending SIPs,...

Shuttered St Croix Refinery Tests EPA’s Air Permit ‘Reactivation’ Policy

A Virgin Islands oil refinery at the center of major controversy over its pollution impact on local residents is suing EPA over the agency’s decision to subject it to strict air permit requirements before it can resume operations, in a suit that will test the agency’s current interpretation of its permitting policy on industrial facilities that are “reactivated.” In its suit filed Jan. 13 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, Port Hamilton Refining and Transportation LLLP...

Environmentalists Target Another San Joaquin SIP Over CAA, Title VI Issues

Environmentalists are raising significant legal concerns over California’s just-approved state implementation plan (SIP) to bring the San Joaquin Valley into attainment with the 2015 federal 8-hour ozone standard by 2037, charging it violates the Clean Air Act (CAA) and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act -- the latest sign of how states are struggling to address such issues in their SIPs in the absence of EPA guidance. During a Jan. 26 meeting, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) approved...

Oil & Gas Group Urges CEQ To Halt, Scale Back NEPA Climate Guidance

A major oil and gas industry group is urging the White House to pause implementation of its guidance for considering greenhouse gas emissions and climate change in National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews, arguing officials must scale back aspects of the guide that are “legally inappropriate.” The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) guidance “is counter-productive climate policy that will likely harm the development of energy projects necessary to provide Americans and our allies with affordable, reliable, and cleaner energy,” the...

EPA Defends Haze Controls In Battle With Wyoming, Environmentalists

In a long-running dispute over EPA’s regional haze program, the agency is claiming broad discretion to choose control technology and defending its right to set air emissions standards on Wyoming power plants as it rejects state claims for weaker controls and environmentalists’ push for tougher limits. In State of Wyoming, et al., v. EPA , now before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, EPA is fighting one of the last battles over haze controls from the first...

Exxon Says DOJ Standing Claims Merit Rehearing Of Landmark Citizen Suit

ExxonMobil Corp. is countering the Justice Department’s (DOJ) push for a federal appeals court to reject the company’s bid for en banc rehearing of a landmark citizen enforcement case, saying DOJ’s novel “forward-looking” standing argument merely reinforces the need for review. In a Jan. 30 reply to DOJ’s Jan. 17 amicus brief, Exxon says the federal government’s argument is contrary to both the majority and minority opinions in Environment Texas Citizen Lobby, Inc. v. ExxonMobil Corp . and...

Midwestern States Press Officials To Quickly Approve Pending E15 Petitions

A bipartisan group of seven attorneys general from Midwestern states is pressing EPA and the White House to quickly approve petitions from states that would allow summertime sales of 15 percent ethanol fuel (E15), a move that would please biofuels groups but frustrate refiners, who warn that it would fragment the fuels market, raising prices. In a Jan. 27 letter to EPA Administrator Michael Regan, and White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Shalanda Young, the AGs of...

EPA sets dates for PM NAAQS hearing

EPA will hold a virtual public hearing on its proposal to tighten national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) on Feb. 21 and Feb. 22, the agency announced, anticipating a large volume of comments on a plan that is backed by environmentalists, but strongly opposed by some industry groups. In a notice scheduled for publication in the Federal Register Jan. 31, EPA says the hearing will last at least two days, and may stretch into...

5th Circuit Stays Refiners’ RFS Mandates, Citing ‘Retroactive’ Waiver Denial

A regional appeals court has stayed renewable fuel standard (RFS) obligations for two small refiners, warning EPA it faces likely defeat over the agency’s “retroactive” policy of denying all requests for RFS waivers from small refiners, at least with regard to past compliance years, and raising the possibility of a clash between judicial circuits. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit in a Jan. 27 order granted requests by small refiners for a stay of RFS compliance obligations...

EPA’s PM NAAQS Plan Requires Equity Focus, But Few New Air Monitors

EPA’s proposal to tighten national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) will require states to relocate some air quality monitors to satisfy a new environmental justice (EJ) focus, and floats technical improvements to such equipment, but will not require any significant expansion of the air monitoring network. The proposal , unveiled Jan. 6 and published in the Federal Register Jan. 27, floats several changes in air monitoring to accommodate any tougher standards. EPA clarifies that...

EPA seeking new state regulator for CASAC

EPA is recruiting a new state air regulator for its panel that advises the administrator on air quality standards, an effort that is likely aimed at replacing James Boylan, a Georgia official who has served on the panel since 2017 and who has generally been less supportive of tougher air quality limits than other panelists. In a notice published in the Federal Register Jan. 27, EPA solicits applications to join the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) from state...

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