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In its denial of a petition from New York State, the EPA continues to disagree with downwind states that argue that sources in upwind states should be forced to eliminate air pollution the downwind states allege contribute significantly to their inability to meet the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone.
In a ruling that helps downwind states with areas in nonattainment with the 2008 National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit declined to vacate the EPA’s 2016 rule to update its Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR). However, the court did remand one […]
Two challenges filed from opposite directions against the EPA’s 2015 primary or health-based National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for Ozone were denied by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. At one end, environmental and health advocacy groups argued that the standard was insufficiently protective of children. At the […]
The EPA’s Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards recently issued guidance on how information on prescribed fires on wildland may be factored into exceptional events demonstrations required by Section 319(b) of the Clean Air Act (CAA). If the Agency accepts a state’s exceptional event demonstration, air pollution resulting from the event is excluded from […]
A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected challenges the Sierra Club mounted against procedures the EPA uses to approve plans states develop to monitor compliance with the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS).
A 1,880-page draft report on the risk particulate matter (PM) imposes on human health may undergo extensive revisions because the EPA’s powerful Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) has concluded that the methods used by the authors of the report are flawed and that the authors’ estimated impact PM has on mortality is overstated.
After grumbling that it intended to resist implementing the revised National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone it issued in 2015, in August 2018, the EPA informed a federal court that it had decided to uphold and defend the NAAQS as they had been promulgated. That decision set in motion the Agency’s responsibility to […]
There is a strong push at the EPA from the White House, Congress, and from some states to assign more weight to background ozone levels in designating areas in or out of attainment with the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone. Probably the most controversial type of background ozone is ozone from other […]
Based on “additional information and analysis,” the EPA is proposing to determine that its Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) Update for the 2008 ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) (October 26, 2016, Federal Register (FR)) satisfies the Agency’s obligation to issue federal implementation plans (FIPs) for 20 states to address air pollution from those […]
A federal district court judge gave the EPA 6 months to promulgate—and post on the Web—final federal implementation plans (FIPs) for five upwind states that are contributing significantly to nonattainment of the 2008 National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone in Connecticut and New York State, both downwind states.