Sierra Club analysts are hitting back at an industry analysis that says about half the country won’t be able to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed ozone regulations.
Last week, the American Petrolium Institute reported 1,433 counties would not be compliant when the EPA lowers the ozone standard to 68 parts per billion. Ozone is the primary ingredient in smog.
Josh Berman, a staff attorney at the Sierra Club, said that report is based on dated information and doesn’t use the proper measurement methodology.
In an interview with the Washington Examiner Wednesday, Berman said the industry analysis relied on data from 2011-13 and included counties that don’t have monitoring devices. Berman said the EPA only looks at counties that have monitoring devices and more recent data would have cleaner air, making it easier to meet the new target.
“It’s entirely beside the point for actual designations that state and counties actually confront,” Berman said of the report.
According to the Sierra Club’s analysis of measurements from 2013-15, 100 counties would be considered out of attainment if the ozone standard were lowered to 70 parts per billion. If the standard is lowered to 67 parts per billion, then 207 counties would be considered out of attainment, and if it was lowered still further to 65 parts per billion, then 314 counties would be considered out of attainment.
The API analysis reported 217 counties across the country are not complying with EPA regulations at the current level of 75 parts per billion, and that about half of the roughly 3,000 counties would not comply under the new rule.
Carlton Carroll, spokesman with the API, said the group stood by its analysis, which called the ozone regulations the “most expensive regulation ever.”
“[The API study] uses the most current EPA data available and shows that large parts of the country could be dealt a severe blow to local economies and jobs if EPA tightens ozone standards,” he said. “The nation’s air is getting cleaner and will continue to improve as states implement the existing standards. Let’s allow the current ozone rules to work and work together to finish implementing them.”
The new ozone rules are expected to be released in the new National Ambient Air Quality Standards on Oct. 1. The EPA is expected to set the standard somewhere between 60 and 70 parts per billion.
The Sierra Club, along with the Environmental Defense Fund and Natural Resources Defense Council, are scheduled to meet with EPA officials Thursday morning about the new ozone rule. Sierra Club representatives will likely push for a lower standard, somewhere closer to the 60 parts per billion mark.
According to their report, a 65 parts per billion ozone standard could mean health benefits such as eliminating 670,000 missed school days and 115,000 missed work days. The report also states half of the counties that exceed the 65 parts per billion ozone standard publicly support a stronger ozone standard.
The report also stated a 70 parts per billion cap on ozone would be weaker than the 75 parts per billion cap instituted in 2008 by then-President Bush. Bush’s regulation put two-thirds more counties out of attainment than a proposed 70 parts per billion cap.
Berman said air quality is steadily improving across the country and the steps needed to get to that level wouldn’t be as costly as some might imagine.
He said the trend of cleaner air under the current regulations would likely continue and states will send their plans to reduce ozone emissions to the EPA in two years. That means the ozone regulations would be built off ozone measurements from 2015-17, which would be lower than the measurements the API used to build their study.
“It’s over-predicting the areas impacted by the new standards because many of those areas will be improving,” he said.
He pointed to the retrofitting of power plants with large emissions, and the closure of some of the worst emitters, and newer, cleaner automobiles as two reasons ozone levels will continue to drop.
