AM-97-34 NAAQS PROCESS AND IMPACT

Description:

When the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the initiation of changes to the arcane air quality standards for ozone and particulate matter last November, two very influential and well-informed legislators took special note. Republican Senator John-Chafee, who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, offered the following perspective: "These proposals will receive close scrutiny by the Congress over the next few months. Considered together, thev are the laraest sinsle reaulatory pronosal ever made bv EPA." A more specific assessment of the potential economic impacts of these changes ranking democrat architect of the amendments: was offered by Congressman John Dingell, the on the House Commerce Committee and a principal original Clean Air Act and all its subsequent "These new standards, if implemented as proposed, will also extend the potent nonattainment provisions of the Act to most of the country's urban areas, with the disastrous consequence of driving much of the remaining industry from our nation's cities. To compound this problem, offset requirements and other new source review provisions will increase the difficulty of luring new companies into nonattainment areas. For areas such as Detroit that have just finished the long and painful steps to comply with the current standards, the new proposals could not be more demoralizing. For existing nonattainment areas, the new proposal will create a dizzying tangle of new regulatory requirements layered on top of the existing nonattainment requirements under the old standards. Indeed, I understand that for many of these areas with the most intractable air quality problems, such as New York, Houston and Los Angeles, their ability to meet even the current ozone standard in the near future is in doubt. In such circumstances, the new standards may pose an impossible challenge, thereby sentencing areas to a future of aggravating sanctions and economic decline.@' When respected legislators like Chafee and Dingell speak out so forcefully and with such candor, the entire community of regulated industries should pay very close attention.