HB2585 - 452R - House Bill Summary

House of Representatives

HB 2585

air quality; regional haze program

Sponsors: Representatives Huffman, Allen, Gullett, Weason, O’Halleran

X	Committee on Environment
	Caucus and COW
	Third Read
	As Passed the House

HB 2585 gives authority to DEQ to submit to EPA a state implementation plan to address regional haze visibility impairment in mandatory federal class I areas (national parks, monuments and wilderness areas) under the federal Clean Air Act.

History

The Regional Haze State Implementation Plan (SIP) is required to protect and improve visibility in the country's 156 national parks and large wilderness areas (referred to as mandatory Class I areas). The rule became final on July 1, 1999, and requires Arizona to develop a revision to the State Implementation Plan (SIP) to address haze for the state's 12 federal parks and wilderness areas caused by all sources of pollutants that impair visibility (primarily smoke, soot, dust, oxides of nitrogen and sulfur dioxide from fires, vehicles, off road equipment, industrial sources and other activities that generate pollution). DEQ initiated a stakeholder process for this effort. The regional haze rule provides two options for states and Indian tribes in the nine state Grand Canyon Visibility Transport Commission (GCVTC) region. States submitting SIPs in 2003 will be implementing GCVTC recommendations. States submitting SIPs in the 2006-2008 time frame will be implementing programs applicable to the rest of the nation. The state has been actively involved in visibility and regional haze issues for some time, beginning with the GCVTC and continuing with the Western Regional Air Partnership (WRAP) , the successor organization to the GCVTC.

Provisions

· Defines the four “Arizona Grand Canyon Visibility Transport Commission class I areas.”

· Defines the eight “Arizona mandatory federal class I areas.”

· Defines the sixteen “Grand Canyon visibility transport commission class I areas”.

· Defines the 156 “Mandatory federal class I areas.” (twelve are in Arizona)

· Allows DEQ to participate in interstate regional haze programs established by the regional planning organization (WRAP).

· Requires the director to submit a regional haze SIP to EPA addressing regional haze visibility impairment in mandatory federal class I areas and allows the director to adopt rules necessary for such revisions. Any of the following may be included in the plan: monitoring strategy, implementation of stationary source emissions reduction strategies, provisions addressing mobile source emissions, provisions addressing the impact of dust emissions, provisions relating to pollution prevention, best available retrofit technologies, a long term strategy, a projection of the improvement in visibility conditions and periodic progress reports.

· Allows the department to establish and participate in intrastate and interstate market trading programs to meet regional haze requirements of the SIP. DEQ may also include those provisions in air quality permits.

· Requires DEQ to establish state wide inventories of current and projected annual emissions of volatile organic compounds, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, elemental and organic carbon, and fine particles from mobile sources for years 2003 through 2018.

· Permits the director to determine if mobile source emissions in any area of the state contribute significantly to the visibility impairment in any of the Grand Canyon visibility transport commission class I areas based on analysis of monitoring data and inventories. If the director finds the above to be true the department is required to establish:

- A mobile source emissions budget and contingency emissions control measures and schedules to manage future growth and emissions in the concerned areas.

- An emissions tracking system for reporting annual mobile source emissions.

· Requires DEQ to establish a statewide inventory and emissions tracking system for the following originating from fire sources: volatile organic compounds, nitrogen oxides, elemental and organic carbon, and fine particle emissions. Defines “fire sources,” as wildland fire, including wildfire, prescribed natural fire, wildland fire use, prescribed fire and agricultural burning that is conducted and occurring on federal, state and private lands.

· Requires the director to cooperate with states, tribes, federal land management agencies, and private entities in establishing emissions goals for fire sources.

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· 45th Legislature