Air quality implementation plans; approval and promulgation; various States: Ohio,
[Federal Register: May 21, 1998 (Volume 63, Number 98)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Page 27895-27897]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr21my98-35]
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
40 CFR Part 52
[OH115-1; FRL-6100-7]
Approval and Promulgation of Maintenance Plan Revisions; Ohio
AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency, (USEPA).
ACTION: Proposed rule.
SUMMARY: The United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) is proposing to approve an April 27, 1998, request from Ohio, for State Implementation Plan (SIP) maintenance plan revisions for the following maintenance areas in Ohio: Canton (Stark County), Cleveland (Lorain, Cuyahoga, Lake, Ashtabula, Geauga, Medina, Summit and Portage Counties), Columbus (Franklin, Delaware and Licking Counties), Steubenville (Jefferson County), Toledo (Lucas and Wood Counties), Youngstown (Mahoning and Trumbull Counties) as well as Clinton County, Columbiana County and Preble County. The revisions would remove the air quality triggers from each area's contingency plan. The contingency plans were included in these areas' maintenance plans to correct violations of the one hour ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS).
DATES: Written comments on this proposal must be received on or before June 22, 1998.
ADDRESSES: Copies of the documents relevant to this action are available for inspection during normal business hours at the following location: Regulation Development Section, Air Programs Branch, (AR- 18J), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 5, 77 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60604.
Please contact Scott Hamilton at (312) 353-4775 before visiting the Region 5 office.
Written comments should be sent to: J. Elmer Bortzer, Chief, Regulation Development Section, Air Programs Branch, (AR-18J), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 5, 77 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60604.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Scott Hamilton, Environmental Scientist, Regulation Development Section, Air Programs Branch (AR- 18J), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 5, 77 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60604, (312) 353-4775.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
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Attainment Areas in Ohio
Since the Clean Air Act (CAA) attainment status designations were made, all of the Ohio areas listed in the summary section of this Federal Register Notice have attained the one hour ozone standard and have been redesignated to attainment for ozone. As a requirement to being redesignated to attainment, these areas developed maintenance plans. The purpose of the maintenance plans is to assure maintenance of the one hour ozone NAAQS for at least ten years. Included in the maintenance plans were contingency provisions. The purpose of the contingency provisions are to identify and correct any violation of the one hour ozone NAAQS in a timely fashion. Triggers are included in the contingency provisions to identify the need to implement measures and correct air quality problems until such time as a revised maintenance or attainment plan could be developed to address the level of the air quality problem. Triggering events in the contingency plans could be linked to ozone air quality and/or an emission level of ozone precursors.
The maintenance plan approvals were finalized by USEPA and published in the Federal Register for these Ohio areas as follows: Canton and Youngstown (61 FR 3319; January 31, 1996), Cleveland (61 FR 20458; May 7, 1996), Columbus (61 FR 3591; February 1, 1996), Steubenville, Columbiana County and Preble County (60 FR 7453; February 8, 1995), Toledo (60 FR 39115; August 1, 1995) and Clinton County (61 FR 11560; March 21, 1996).
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One Hour Ozone Standard Revocation
On July 18, 1998, USEPA finalized a revision to the NAAQS for ozone which changed the standard from 0.12 parts per million (ppm) averaged over one hour, to 0.08 ppm, averaged over eight hours. USEPA is revoking the one hour standard in separate rulemakings based on an area's attainment of the one hour ozone standard. The first round of revocations will be for areas attaining the one hour standard based on quality assured air monitoring data for the years 1994-1996. The second round of one hour ozone standard revocations will be for areas attaining the one hour standard based on quality assured air monitoring data for the years 1995-1997. After these two rulemakings are finalized, the USEPA intends to publish rulemakings on an annual basis revoking the one hour ozone standard for additional areas that come into attainment of the one hour standard.
On January 16, 1998, USEPA published a proposed rule (63 FR 2726) in the Federal Register proposing to revoke the one hour ozone standard in areas attaining the standard based on quality assured air monitoring data for the years 1994-1996 (first round of revocations). In that proposal, USEPA proposed to revoke the one hour ozone standard in the Ohio areas subject to this proposed action [Canton (Stark County), Cleveland (Lorain, Cuyahoga, Lake, Ashtabula, Geauga, Medina, Summit and Portage Counties), Columbus (Franklin, Delaware and Licking Counties), Steubenville (Jefferson County), Toledo (Lucas and Wood Counties), Youngstown (Mahoning and Trumbull Counties)] as
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well as Clinton, Columbiana and Preble Counties.
On July 16, 1997, President Clinton issued a directive to Administrator Browner on implementation of the new ozone standard, as well as the current one hour ozone standard (62 FR 38421). In that directive the President laid out a plan on how the new ozone and particulate matter standards, as well as the current one hour standard, are to be implemented. A December 29, 1997, memorandum entitled ``Guidance for Implementing the 1-Hour and Pre-Existing PM10 NAAQS'' signed by Richard D. Wilson, USEPA's Acting Assistant Administrator for Air and Radiation reflected that directive. The purpose of this guidance document is to ensure that the momentum gained by States to attain the one hour ozone NAAQS was not lost when moving toward implementing the eight hour ozone NAAQS.
The guidance document explains that maintenance plans will remain in effect for areas where the one hour standard is revoked; however, those maintenance plans may be revised to withdraw certain contingency measure provisions that have not been triggered or implemented prior to USEPA's determination of attainment and revocation. Where the contingency measure is linked to the one hour ozone standard or air quality ozone concentrations, the measures may be removed from the maintenance plan. Measures linked to non-air quality elements, such as emissions increases or vehicle miles traveled, may be removed if the State demonstrates that removing the measure will not affect an area's ability to attain the eight hour ozone standard.
In other words, after the one hour standard is revoked for an area, USEPA believes it is permissible to withdraw contingency measures designed to correct violations of that standard. Therefore, since such measures were designed to address future violations of a standard that no longer exists, it is no longer necessary to retain them. Furthermore, USEPA believes that future attainment and maintenance planning efforts should be directed toward attaining the eight hour ozone NAAQS.
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Review of the State Submittal
In a letter from Donald R. Schregardus, Director, Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA) received by USEPA on April 27, 1998, OEPA officially requested that all air quality triggers be deleted from the maintenance plans for the areas in Ohio now attaining the one hour ozone standard and where USEPA has proposed to revoke the one hour standard (the areas listed in the Summary Section). As part of the implementation of the eight hour ozone standard, the State's ozone air quality will be evaluated and eight hour attainment and nonattainment designations will be made. USEPA believes that Ohio's request is consistent with the December 29, 1997, guidance document and the July 16, 1997, Presidential Directive, and that the request is approvable.
The OEPA has officially announced a public hearing on this matter to be held on June 1, 1998.
This revision is being proposed under a procedure called parallel processing, whereby USEPA proposes rulemaking action concurrently with the State's procedures for amending its regulations. If the proposed revision is substantially changed USEPA will evaluate those changes and may publish another notice of proposed rulemaking. If no substantial changes are made other than any consistent with this notice, the USEPA will publish a final rulemaking on the revisions. The final rulemaking action by USEPA on Ohio's request to revise the maintenance plans to remove air quality triggers will occur only after the one hour ozone standard has been revoked in final and Ohio's public hearing documentation is submitted to the USEPA.
While Ohio requested that the air quality triggers in Dayton's maintenance plan be removed, USEPA has yet to propose revocation of the one hour standard for Dayton. Revocation of the one hour standard is a prerequisite for revising maintenance plans to remove contingency provisions. USEPA will address Dayton in a future rulemaking.
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USEPA Proposed Action
The USEPA is proposing to approve the requested revision to the above mentioned maintenance plans in Ohio. The USEPA is parallel processing this request concurrent with the state proceedings. Written comments must be received by USEPA on or by June 22, 1998.
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Administrative Requirements
(A) Future Requests
Nothing in this action should be construed as permitting, allowing or establishing a precedent for any future request for revision to any SIP. Each request for revision to the SIP shall be considered separately in light of specific technical, economic, and environmental factors and in relation to relevant statutory and regulatory requirements.
(B) Executive Order 12866
The Office of Management and Budget has exempted this regulatory action from Executive Order 12866 review.
(C) Regulatory Flexibility
Under the Regulatory Flexibility Act, 5 U.S.C. section 600 et seq., USEPA must prepare a regulatory flexibility analysis assessing the impact of any proposed or final rule on small entities. 5 U.S.C. sections 603 and 604. Alternatively, USEPA may certify that the rule will not have a significant impact on a substantial number of small entities. Small entities include small businesses, small not-for-profit enterprises, and government entities with jurisdiction over populations of less than 50,000.
SIP approvals under section 110 and subchapter I, part D of the Act do not create any new requirements, but simply approve requirements that the State is already imposing. Therefore, because the Federal SIP approval does not impose any new requirements, the Administrator certifies that it does not have a significant impact on any small entities affected. Moreover, due to the nature of the Federal-State relationship under the Act, preparation of a flexibility analysis would constitute Federal inquiry into the economic reasonableness of the State action. The Clean Air Act forbids USEPA to base its actions concerning SIPs on such grounds. Union Electric Co. v. USEPA, 427 U.S. 246, 256-66 (1976); 42 U.S.C. 7410(a)(2).
(D) Unfunded Mandates
Under Section 202 of the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995, signed into law on March 22, 1995, USEPA must undertake various actions in association with any proposed or final rule that includes a Federal mandate that may result in estimated costs to state, local, or tribal governments in the aggregate; or to the private sector, of $100 million or more. This Federal action approves pre-existing requirements under state or local law, and imposes no new requirements. Accordingly, no additional costs to state, local, or tribal governments, or the private sector, result from this action.
(E) Audit Privilege and Immunity Law
Nothing in this action should be construed as making any determination or expressing any position regarding Ohio's audit privilege and immunity law (Sections 3745.70-3745.73 of the Ohio Revised Code ). USEPA will be reviewing the effect of the Ohio audit privilege and immunity law on various Ohio environmental programs,
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including those under the Clean Air Act, and taking appropriate action(s), if any, after thorough analysis and opportunity for Ohio to state and explain its views and positions on the issues raised by the law. The action taken herein does not express or imply any viewpoint on the question of whether there are legal deficiencies in this or any Ohio Clean Air Act program resulting from the effect of the audit privilege and immunity law. As a consequence of the review process, the regulations subject to the action taken herein may be disapproved, federal approval for the Clean Air Act program under which they are implemented may be withdrawn, or other appropriate action may be taken, as necessary.
List of Subjects in 40 CFR Part 52
Environmental protection, Air pollution control, Hydrocarbons, Intergovernmental relations, Ozone, Nitrogen oxides, Implementation plans.
Authority: 42 U.S.C. 7401 et seq.
Dated: May 7, 1998. Robert Springer, Acting Regional Administrator, Region V.
[FR Doc. 98-13614Filed5-20-98; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6560-50-P
