The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to announce its final Cross State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) update by the end of summer 2016. But does the update account for the fact that several new regulatory programs that could significantly improve downwind air quality?
In his posts of August 3, 2015 and April 30, 2014, ACOEL Fellow Paul Seals likened the voyage of the interstate transport of air pollutants to “Homer’s Odyssey”. He promised us all that the D.C. Circuit decision of June 24, 2015, in the case of EME Homer City Generation, L.P., v. EPA, concerning the CSAPR would not end the voyage of interstate transport – and indeed it has not.
Critical to the development of a rule to address the interstate transport of air pollutants is that the rule not call for emission reductions that are more than necessary to achieve attainment in every downwind state. EPA’s 2017 deadline for attaining the 2008 ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) invites the question of what the ozone air quality is likely to be in 2017. EPA’s proposed CSAPR Update identified only 4 monitors in the East that it predicted to be in non-attainment with the 2008 ozone NAAQS in 2017.
EPA’s prediction of 2017 air quality, however, did not take into account several new regulatory programs that are either on-the-books or on-the-way. These programs are certain to continue to improve ozone air quality in the East. Among the more significant of these programs are:
- Pennsylvania Reasonably Available Control Technology (RACT) II;
- Ozone Transport Commission Model Rules;
- Connecticut RACT;
- New York High Energy Demand Day (HEDD) controls; and
- Connecticut High Energy Demand Day (HEDD) controls
To illustrate the significance of this point, Alpine Geophysics modeled the impact of only a portion of the Pennsylvania RACT II program on ozone concentrations at the nonattainment monitors downwind of Pennsylvania identified by in the CSAPR proposal. The following results from the Alpine Geophysics report illustrate that even one of these new programs is likely to significantly improve ozone air quality at the critical monitors in the East:
EPA Nonattainment Monitors | Ozone Improvement needed (ppb) | Ozone Improvement Achieved By PA RACT Alone |
| Connecticut Fairfield (90013007) | 1.2 | 83% |
| Connecticut Fairfield (90019003) | 2.1 | 48% |
| Connecticut New Havens (90019003) | 1.3 | 54% |
Such improvement - related to only one of the unaddressed programs - raises the question about whether all of the EPA identified nonattainment monitors will, in fact, be in attainment with the 2008 ozone NAAQS when these on-the-books and on-the-way programs are implemented in 2017, even without the CSAPR update.
The answer to this question, and to the merit of any new transport rule, lies with additional air quality modeling of these programs. When EPA announces its final rule on the CSAPR update by the end of summer, we will see whether the agency has taken account of these additional programs and see the future direction of this on-going odyssey.
