U.S. Congress Blocks Clean Air Enforcement
© Environment News Service (ENS) 2000
June 22, 2000
By Cat Lazaroff
WASHINGTON, DC, June 22, 2000 (ENS) - As a coalition of environmental groups released a report listing more than 300 counties across the U.S. that fail to meet federal clean air standards, the House of Representatives voted Wednesday to block federal regulators from using such information to impose new pollution emissions standards.
By a 226 to 199 vote, the House approved a spending bill carrying a rider that would prevent the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from identifying areas with dangerously high levels of ground level ozone and smog.
The measure would keep the EPA from enforcing new rules aimed at reducing emissions from automobiles and factories.
The vote was "highly symbolic" noted Frank O'Donnell, executive director of the Clean Air Trust.
"It shows that this Congress is more interested in campaign contributions from big polluters than in protecting public health," charged O'Donnell. "And it shows that the Clean Air Act remains in jeopardy. The public cannot take its enforcement for granted."
The EPA’s smog and soot rules were overturned last year by a federal court, which ruled that the agency has exceeded its regulatory authority in crafting the rules. The Supreme Court has agreed to review that ruling, and to look into the question of whether the EPA should be forced to consider the economic effects of its regulations.Since 1997, the EPA has asked more than 600 urban and suburban counties to compile air quality statistics that include levels of ground level ozone, a major component of smog. These statistics can be used to identify regions at particular risk of dangerous smog levels. The EPA may then order local governments to develop plans to reduce air pollution, or risk losing federal transportation funds.
House Republicans, backed by 58 Democrats, noted that labeling a community as having polluted air could discourage economic investment in the region. They approved language that would prevent such labeling under the newer, more stringent regulations, at least until the Supreme Court has a chance to rule on the regulations.
"The only common sense approach is to delay this process until the Supreme Court reaches its decision," said Representative Mac Collins, who cosponsored the amendment with John Linder. Both Congressmen are Republicans from Georgia.
Representative Sherwood Boehlert, a New York Republican, warned that refusing to label areas with air quality problems will not solve those problems. "The idea here is dirty air doesn't exist if it isn't officially recognized," said Boehlert.
The Clean Air Network and Clear the Air, coalitions that together represent hundreds of environmental, public health and citizens groups, revealed Wednesday that more than half the counties that monitor smog pollution have consistently reported levels above what the EPA considers safe to breathe for the past three years.
"We’ve known for years that smog is a growing problem nationwide," said Jayne Mardock of the Clean Air Network, an author of the report. "Now 117 million Americans are breathing unhealthy air. This is not the time to weaken our anti-smog program."The report, "Smog Watch 2000," highlighted two policy decisions that could clean up two of the biggest smog producers: power plants and diesel trucks and buses.
"Emissions from power plants make up a quarter of the nitrogen oxides that lead to smog," said Angela Ledford, campaign manager of Clear the Air, the National Campaign Against Dirty Power. "We cannot make the air safe to breathe without getting power plants to clean up their act."
Nineteen eastern states are supposed to submit plans this summer to reduce their power plant emissions up to 85 percent by 2003.
To tackle auto emissions, the EPA and the Clean Air Act require polluted urban centers to use reformulated gasoline (RFG), which is blended with additives like methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) or ethanol to burn more cleanly. RFG requirements are now being blamed for higher gas prices in some Midwestern regions, and lawmakers from those states are urging the EPA to suspend its clean fuel rules.
The amendment just passed by the House would make it impossible for the EPA to identify other areas that might need to use RFG or take other clean air measures to meet more stringent air quality standards.
The Clean Air Trust’s O'Donnell argued that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and related polluter lobbies want the Supreme Court to eliminate the public's right to know if it is breathing healthy air.
Rush hour traffic in Atlanta, Georgia, one of the nation's smoggiest cities (Photo courtesy Georgia Department of Transportation)
"The polluters desperately want to keep this information secret - just as the big oil companies want to keep secret how they are gouging consumers in the Midwest while raking in record profits," O'Donnell said.
While Congressional lawmakers are trying to limit the EPA's ability to cut smog by regulation, environmental groups say the agency is not doing enough to enforce laws already on the books.
Two environmental groups took action Wednesday against what they termed the EPA’s illegally lax enforcement of clean air rules in 35 states, the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands.The Sierra Club and the New York Public Interest Research Group filed suit in federal court in an attempt to force the EPA to strengthen air pollution regulations in these states. The groups charge that the agency has illegally allowed the states to operate weak air pollution permit programs for more than six years, and that EPA must instead take over the permit programs in these states.
The permit programs are required by amendments to the Clean Air Act signed by President George Bush in 1990. The law requires that major air pollution sources be regulated under detailed permits - sometimes called "Title V" or "Operating" permits - that are enforceable by citizens and EPA in federal court. The permits must spell out pollution limits, monitoring requirements, compliance schedules, and other provisions to implement clean air laws.
The amendments required states to adopt permit programs by 1993, but EPA found programs in many states to be deficient.
Defects found by EPA in the state permit programs include illegal waivers and exemptions, inadequate requirements for emissions limits, lenient penalties, and improper barriers to citizens' ability to challenge weak permits.
Other deficiencies allow polluters to assert improper defenses, evade disclosure of violations, and avoid compliance with emission limits. A number of states fail to adequately provide for public notice and other public participation rights in the permit process. Interim approval allows all these deficiencies to remain uncorrected.
Instead of rejecting these programs, EPA used a provision in the law that allowed a one time interim approval that should last no more than two years. At the end of the two year period, unless the states had come up with an adequate set of regulations, EPA was to take over the program itself. However, on May 22, EPA issued another blanket extension of the faulty regulations in 37 separate jurisdictions - the fourth such extension since 1995.
"The Clean Air Act explicitly prohibits these delays," said Earthjustice attorney David Baron, who represents the plaintiffs in the new lawsuit. "The law required correction of all deficiencies years ago, and it's inexcusable, not to mention illegal, to allow continuation of these weak programs. Clean air is essential for the health of every living thing. To play fast and loose with the law is deplorable."
The states and territories affected by the lawsuit are: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virgin Islands, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin.