Washington, DC - Interim Attorney General Eugene A. Adams announced today that the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia issued a unanimous ruling on December 22, 2006, holding that EPA rules regarding the implementation of National Ambient Air Quality Standards ("NAAQS") for ozone violated the Clean Air Act.
With support from the District Department of the Environment, the Attorney General for the District of Columbia joined Massachusetts, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, New York, Pennsylvania, the South Coast Air Quality Management District (California), and various environmental groups in challenging these standards.
The District challenged the rules because they would have likely led to an increase in long range transport pollution from industry in other states -- the largest source of air pollution in the District, and left many of the 36 major sources of pollution within the District outside its regulatory reach. This would have created significant barriers to the District's efforts to achieve compliance with the NAAQS.
"Public safety is at the heart of the matter, and I am please that the Court recognizes the importance of protecting the quality of the air we all breathe," said General Adams.
"This important decision helps us protect our citizens from asthma and other respiratory illnesses triggered by ozone and allows the District to retain strict controls on air pollution," said Elizabeth Berry, Acting Director for the District Department of the Environment.
The air quality standards involved in the suit were originally part of the 1990 amendments to the Clean Air Act, which required stronger anti-smog measures in cities violating ozone standards, including limits on pollution from new and expanded factories, requirements for annual cuts in smog-forming emissions, and caps on truck and car exhaust. In 1997, EPA found that the 1990 "1-hour" ozone standard wasn't strong enough to protect health, and adopted a new "8-hour" standard to provide greater protection. But, paradoxically, in 2004 the agency adopted rules that weakened pollution control requirements by allowing an extension of attainment dates for those areas not meeting both the old 1-hour and the new 8-hour standards and lifting of some of the pollution control devices formerly required under the 1-hour ozone standard.
Select the link below for more information on the decision: