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Approval and Promulgation of Implementation Plans; Designation of Areas for Air Quality Planning Purposes; Redesignation of the Metropolitan Washington Carbon Monoxide Area to Attainment and Approval of the Area's Maintenance Plan and Emission Inventory; Commonwealth of Virginia, District of Columbia and the State of Maryland
[Federal Register: January 30, 1996 (Volume 61, Number 20)] [Rules and Regulations] [Page 2931-2938] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY 40 CFR Parts 52 and 81 [FRL-5324-9; MD-45-3003, MD-45-3004; MD-45-3007; VA-53-5001, VA-53- 5002; VA-34-5003, VA-34-5004; DC-30-2001; DC-30-2002, DC-10-2003] Approval and Promulgation of Implementation Plans; Designation of Areas for Air Quality Planning Purposes; Redesignation of the Metropolitan Washington Carbon Monoxide Area to Attainment and Approval of the Area's Maintenance Plan and Emission Inventory; Commonwealth of Virginia, District of Columbia and the State of Maryland AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). ACTION: Direct final rule.
SUMMARY: EPA is approving a maintenance plan and a request to redesignate the Metropolitan Washington area; including the Counties of Alexandria and Arlington, Virginia; Prince Georges and Montgomery Counties in Maryland, and the District of Columbia (the ``Washington Carbon Monoxide (CO) nonattainment area'') from nonattainment to attainment for CO. The maintenance plan and redesignation requests were submitted by the Commonwealth of Virginia and the State of Maryland and the District of Columbia. Under the 1990 amendments of the Clean Air Act (CAA) designations can be revised if sufficient data is available to warrant such revisions. In this action, EPA is approving Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia requests because it meets the maintenance plan and redesignation requirements set forth in the CAA. This action is being taken under section 110 of the CAA. DATES: This action will become effective on March 15, 1996 unless, by February 29, 1996 adverse or critical comments are received. If the effective date is delayed, timely notice will be published in the Federal Register. ADDRESSES: Comments may be mailed to Marcia L. Spink, Associate Director, Air Programs, Mailcode 3AT00, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region III, 841 Chestnut Building, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19107. Copies of the documents relevant to this action are available for public inspection during normal business hours at the Air, Radiation, and Toxics Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region III, 841 Chestnut Building, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19107; the Air and Radiation Docket and Information Center, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 401 M Street, SW, Washington, DC 20460; District of Columbia Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, 2100 Martin Luther King Ave, S.E., Washington, DC 20020; Maryland Department of the Environment, 2500 Broening Highway, Baltimore, Maryland 21224; Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, 629 East Main Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Kelly A. Sheckler, (215) 597-6863. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On October 4, 1995 the Commonwealth of Virginia, and on October 12, 1995 the State of Maryland and the District of Columbia submitted formal revisions to their State Implementation Plans (SIP). The SIP revisions consists of a request to redesignate the Virginia, Maryland and District of Columbia portions of the Metropolitan Washington area from nonattainment to attainment for carbon monoxide and a maintenance plan. [[Page 2932]] I. Background The Metropolitan Washington area, was a pre-1990 CO nonattainment area and continued to be designated as nonattainment for CO by operation of law as per section 107(d)(1)(C)(i) of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. The National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for CO is 9.5 parts per million (ppm). CO nonattainment areas can be classified as moderate or serious, based on their design values. Since the Washington CO nonattainment area had a design value of 11.6 ppm (based on 1988 and 1989 data), the area was classified as moderate. The CAA established an attainment date of December 31, 1995, for all moderate CO areas. The Metropolitan Washington area has ambient air quality monitoring data showing attainment of the CO NAAQS from 1989 through 1993. Therefore, in an effort to comply with the CAA and to ensure continued attainment of the NAAQS, on October 4, 1995 the Commonwealth of Virginia submitted a CO redesignation request and a maintenance plan for the Virginia portion of the Metropolitan Washington area. The State of Maryland submitted on October 12, 1995 a CO redesignation request and maintenance plan for the Maryland portion of the Metropolitan Washington area and on October 12, 1995 the District of Columbia submitted a CO redesignation request and maintenance plan. Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia submitted evidence that public hearings were held on September 6, 1995 in Virginia, September 15, 1995 in Maryland and September 18, 1995 in the District of Columbia. II. Evaluation Criteria Section 107(d)(3)(E) of the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments provides five specific requirements that an area must meet in order to be redesignated from nonattainment to attainment.
- The area must have attained the applicable NAAQS;
- The area must have a fully approved SIP under section 110(k) of CAA;
- The air quality improvement must be permanent and enforceable;
- The area must have a fully approved maintenance plan pursuant to section 175A of the CAA;
- The area must meet all applicable requirements under section 110 and Part D of the CAA; III. Review of State Submittal On October 12, 1995, EPA determined that the information received from the Commonwealth of Virginia, the State of Maryland and the District of Columbia constituted a complete redesignation request under the general completeness criteria of 40 CFR part 51, appendix V, Secs. 2.1 and 2.2.
The Virginia, Maryland and District of Columbia redesignation requests for the Metropolitan Washington area meets the five requirements of section 107(d)(3)(E), noted above. The following is a brief description of how the State has fulfilled each of these requirements.
- Attainment of the CO NAAQS Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia have qualityassured CO ambient air monitoring data showing that the Metropolitan Washington area has met the CO NAAQS. The Virginia, Maryland and District of Columbia requests are based on an analysis of qualityassured CO air monitoring data which is relevant to the maintenance plan and to the redesignation request. To attain the CO NAAQS, an area must have complete quality-assured data showing no more than one exceedance of the standard per year over at least two consecutive years. The ambient air CO monitoring data for calendar year 1988 through calendar year 1995, relied upon by Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia in their redesignation requests, shows no violations of the CO NAAQS in the Metropolitan Washington area. Because the area has complete quality assured data showing no more than one exceedance of the standard per year over at least two consecutive years (1994 and 1995), the area has met the first statutory criterion of attainment of the CO NAAQS (40 CFR 50.8 and appendix C). Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia have committed to continue monitoring in this area in accordance with 40 CFR part 58. 2. Fully Approved SIP Under Section 110(k) of the CAA Virginia's, Maryland's and the District of Columbia's CO SIPs are fully approved by EPA as meeting all the requirements of Section 110(a)(2)(I) of the Act, including the requirements of Part D (relating to nonattainment), which were due prior to the date of Virginia's, Maryland's and the District of Columbia's redesignation requests. Maryland's CO SIP was fully approved by EPA on September 19, 1994, at 40 CFR Sec. 52.1070(c)(71), (49 FR 36645). Virginia's CO SIP was approved by EPA on January 25, 1984 at 40 CFR Sec. 52.2420(c)(78), (49 FR 3083). The District's CO SIP approved by EPA on October 3, 1984 at 40 CFR Sec. 52.47(c)(28), (49 FR 39059). The 1990 CAAA required that nonattainment areas achieve specific new requirements depending on the severity of the nonattainment classification. Requirements for the Metropolitan Washington area include the preparation of a 1990 emission inventory with periodic updates, adoption of an oxygenated fuels program, the development of contingency measures, and development of conformity procedures. Each of these requirements added by the 1990 Amendments to the CAA are discussed in greater detail below. Consistent with the October 14, 1994 EPA guidance from Mary D. Nichols entitled ``Part D New Source Review (Part D NSR) Requirements for Areas Requesting Redesignation to Attainment,'' EPA is not requiring full approval of a Part D NSR program by Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia as a prerequisite to redesignation to attainment. Under this guidance, nonattainment areas may be redesignated to attainment notwithstanding the lack of a fully-approved Part D NSR program, so long as the program is not relied upon for maintenance. Because the Metropolitan Washington area is being redesignated to attainment by this action, Virginia's, Maryland's and the District of Columbia's Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) requirements will be applicable to new or modified sources in the Metropolitan Washington area. All three States have been delegated PSD authority (See Sec. 52.499 District of Columbia, 43 FR 26410, June 19, 1978, as amended 45 FR 52741, August 7, 1980; Sec. 52.1116 Maryland, 45 FR 52741, August 7, 1980, as amended 47 FR 7835, February 23, 1982; Sec. 52.2448 Virginia 39 FR 7284, February 25, 1974.) A. Emission Inventory
On March 1994 Maryland submitted a 1990 CO base year inventory to EPA for review and approval. On November 1, 1993 and April 3, 1995, Virginia submitted a 1990 CO base year emissions inventory to EPA for review and approval. On January 13, 1994 the District of Columbia submitted a 1990 CO base year emissions inventory to EPA for review and approval. This inventory was used as the basis for calculations to demonstrate maintenance. Virginia's, Maryland's and the District of Columbia's submittal contains the detailed inventory data and summaries by source category. Each of the State's submittals also contains information related to how it comported with EPA's guidance, and which model and emission factors were used (note, the MOBILE 5a model was used), how [[Page 2933]]
vehicle miles travelled (VMT) data was generated, and other technical information verifying the emission inventory. A summary of the base year and projected maintenance year inventories are shown in the following table in this section.
Section 172(c)(3) of the CAA requires that nonattainment plan provisions include a comprehensive, accurate, and current inventory of actual emissions from all sources of relevant pollutants in the nonattainment area. Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia included the requisite inventory in the CO SIP. The base year for the inventory was 1990, using a three month CO season of November 1990 through January 1991.
Stationary point sources, stationary area sources, on-road mobile sources, and nonroad mobile sources of CO were included in the inventory. Stationary sources with emissions of greater than 100 tons per year were also included in the inventory. The following list presents a summary of the CO peak season daily emissions estimates in tons per winter day by source category: Wintertime CO Emissions [Tons per day] Point State Mobile Area (stationary) sources sources sources District of Columbia-Carbon Monoxide Designation Classification Date\1\ Type Date\1\ Type Washington Area: Washington Entire Area....... Attainment \1\This date is November 15, 1990, unless otherwise noted. Maryland-Carbon Monoxide Designation Classification Date\1\ Type Date\1\ Type * Washington Area: Montgomery County (part) Attainment Election Districts 4, 7, 13. Prince George's County (part) Attainment Election Districts 2, 6, 12, 16, 17, 18. * \1\This date is November 15, 1990, unless otherwise noted. Virginia-Carbon Monoxide Designation Classification Date\1\ Type Date\1\ Type Washington area: Alexandria................... Attainment ...................... Arlington County............. Attainment ...................... * \1\This date is November 15, 1990, unless otherwise noted.