ADEQ plans meetings on EPA Ozone rule, no word on Clean Power rules

The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) has scheduled its first stakeholders’ meeting a week before Christmas to discuss drafting new ozone and particulate matter rules that meet federal Clean Air quality standards.

The meeting comes only weeks after Gov.-elect Asa Hutchinson and Attorney General Dustin McDaniel asked Environmental Protection Agency Chief Gina McCarthy to withdraw the agency’s proposed rules to cut the nation’s carbon emissions that threatens to shut down part of Arkansas’ coal-fired electric generation.

Although the ozone and carbon emissions are part of the same wide-ranging federal Clean Air Act, both are governed by a different set of standards and rules. The first meeting on the new ozone standards will take place at ADEQ’s Northshore headquarters in North Little Rock at 1 p.m. on Dec. 18, less than three weeks after the public comment period ended on the so-called “greenhouse gas” regulations.

ADEQ spokeswoman Katherine Benenati said stakeholders representing a variety of interested parties have been invited to the meeting, which is also open to the public. She said the ADEQ staff will present information on the national ambient air quality standards and the State Implementation Plan (SIP) process during the scheduled three-hour meeting.

SURPRISE EPA OZONE STANDARD
The holiday meeting was called in response to the EPA’s surprise announcement on the day before Thanksgiving to tighten the National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for ozone, raising the anger of the business lobby and Republican members of Congress who have questioned the timing of the federal guidelines.

Under the new proposal that the EPA says was based on “extensive recent scientific evidence” concerning the harmful effects of ground-level ozone, or smog, the Obama Administration has proposed to set the new standards within a range of 65 to 70 parts per billion (ppb), or possibly as low as 60 ppb.

“It empowers the American people with updated air quality information to protect our loved ones – because whether we work or play outdoors – we deserve to know the air we breathe is safe,” McCarthy said on Nov. 26. “Fulfilling the promise of the Clean Air Act has always been EPA’s responsibility. Our health protections have endured because they’re engineered to evolve, so that’s why we’re using the latest science to update air quality standards – to fulfill the law’s promise, and defend each and every person’s right to clean air.”

Under The Clean Air Act, the EPA must review ozone standards every five years by following a set of open, transparent steps and considering the advice of a panel of independent experts. EPA last updated these standards in 2008, setting them at 75 ppb.

This new proposal, however, is separate from the EPA’s carbon emission guidelines that Arkansas and other state must have in place by the summer of 2015. On Dec. 1, Gov.-elect Asa Hutchinson sent a letter to the EPA’s McCarthy urging the federal agency to postpone the president’s so-called “Clear Power Plan,” which proposes a 30% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants by 2030 from 2005 levels.

Under Gov. Mike Beebe, the ADEQ and state Public Service Commission brought together about 20 stakeholder groups representing utilities, state agencies, environmental advocates, energy efficiency experts, consumers and other interested parties to discuss the EPA’s proposed “dirty air” guidelines announced in June.
Benenati said no future stakeholder meetings have been scheduled to discuss carbon emissions guidelines for Arkansas. Hutchinson’s office has also not indicated if his administration plans to continue stakeholder meetings on the “dirty air” rules once he takes over as governor.

EPA PUSHES FOR URBAN AIR QUALITY
According to the EPA, the benefits of meeting the proposed ozone standards will significantly outweigh the costs. The federal agency estimates that the “large health benefits” to be gained by avoiding asthma attacks, heart attacks, missed school days and premature deaths are valued at $6.4 to $13 billion annually in 2025 for a standard of 70 ppb, and $19 to $38 billion annually in 2025 for a standard of 65 ppb. Annual costs are estimated at $3.9 billion in 2025 for a standard of 70 ppb, and $15 billion for a standard at 65 ppb.

In addition, the EPA said that federal programs to reduce air pollution from fuels, vehicles and engines of all sizes, power plants and other industries shows that the vast majority of U.S. counties with monitors would meet the more protective standards by 2025 with the current rules now in place or underway.

Nationally, from 1980 to 2013, average ozone levels have fallen 33%, the EPA said, adding that it projects this progress will continue. Still, Republican lawmakers, state regulators and industry groups are displeased not only at the timing of the new ozone proposal, but add that the new rules are just as burdensome as the EPA’s sister guidelines on carbon emissions.

In fact, ADEQ’s counterparts at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (ATEQ) say the new rules will increase cost to industry and consumers and offer no significant health benefits.

“First, I find it offensive for EPA to make this announcement the day before Thanksgiving without giving the TCEQ, one of the largest environmental agencies in the world, a courtesy call to alert us it was coming,” said TCEQ Commissioner Toby Baker. “Second, if the EPA is proposing new standards based on the best available science, as Administrator McCarthy claims, wouldn’t they propose a single new standard based on that science that is most protective of public health?”

“Unfortunately this appears to be a unilateral lowering of standards for the sake of lowering standards,” added TCEQ Commissioner Zak Covar.

According to the ADEQ, new guidelines for particulate matter up to 2.5 micrograms in size are being added to the state air pollution control regulations in order to comply with federal ozone standards. The six most common pollutants under the EPA’s ambient air quality standards include particulate matter, ground-level ozone, carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide and lead.

The EPA will seek public comment on the proposal for 90 days following publication in the Federal Register, and the agency plans to hold three public hearings. The federal agency plans to issue final ozone standards by Oct. 1, 2015.