Senators clash on curbing EPA ozone rules

OREANDA-NEWS. June 08, 2015. US Senate Republicans and Democrats clashed over the need to limit the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) ability to update federal ozone standards.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee yesterday debated three bills proposed by Republicans, who say tighter ozone standards are becoming too difficult for some areas of the US to achieve and carry great economic costs.

Committee chairman James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) called EPA's recent proposal to tighten the ozone standards proposal "the most expensive regulation in history," saying it could have compliance costs of \\$1.7tn and lead to 1.4mn lost jobs. Inhofe said as many as 67pc of US counties would not meet the tighter proposed standards, including some national park areas, even thoguh the pollution affecting them originated elsewhere.

Democrats on the committee, led by senator Barbara Boxer of California, defended the tighter standard, noting negative public health and economic impacts of ozone pollution. Boxer reminded the committee that EPA is required by law to set ozone standards solely on the basis of the latest science and review the rules every five years to ensure they are current.

"Despite what some of my Republican colleagues may try to claim today, scientists overwhelmingly agree that EPA needs to adopt a stricter standard to protect the health of the American people, especially our children and the elderly," Boxer said.

EPA has proposed lowering the national ambient air quality standard for ground-level ozone, the main component of smog, to around 65-70 parts per billion (ppb) from 75ppb. The agency says it is on track to meet a court-ordered 1 October deadline to finalize the standards.

The bills discussed by the committee included S 640 by senator Jeff Flake (R-Arizona), which would give states more time to meet the standard and would extend the time between EPA reviews of the standards to 10 years from five.

S 751 by senator John Thune (R-South Dakota), would require EPA to take feasibility and cost into consideration when setting set national ambient air quality standards for ozone, among other provisions. The Clean Air Act currently requires EPA to set the standards based solely on public health considerations, with cost taken into account during implementation.

S 638, also introduced by Flake, would streamline the process for areas to demonstrate that a violation of the standards was due to an "exceptional event," which EPA defines as incidents that affect air quality that cannot be "reasonably" controlled to meet air standards. Such events may include dust storms or wildfires.