2017-27432. Approval of California Air Plan Revisions, San Diego County Air Pollution Control District

AGENCY:

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

ACTION:

Proposed rule.

SUMMARY:

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing to approve revisions to the San Diego County Air Pollution Control District (SDCAPCD) portion of the California State Implementation Plan (SIP). These revisions concern volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from polyester resin operations. We are proposing to approve a local rule to regulate these emission sources under the Clean Air Act (CAA or “the Act”), as well as a rule rescission. We are taking comments on this proposal and plan to follow with a final action.

DATES:

Any comments must arrive by January 19, 2018.

ADDRESSES:

Submit your comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPA-R09-OAR-2017-0140 at http://www.regulations.gov,, or via email to Doris Lo, Rulemaking Office Chief at [e-mail]. For comments submitted at Regulations.gov, follow the online instructions for submitting comments. Once submitted, comments cannot be removed or edited from Regulations.gov. For either manner of submission, the EPA may publish any comment received to its public docket. Do not submit electronically any information you consider to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Multimedia submissions (audio, video, etc.) must be accompanied by a written comment. The written comment is considered the official comment and should include discussion of all points you wish to make. The EPA will generally not consider comments or comment contents located outside of the primary submission (i.e. on the web, cloud, or other file sharing system). For additional submission methods, please contact the person identified in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section. For the full EPA public comment policy, information about CBI or multimedia submissions, and general guidance on making effective comments, please visit http://www2.epa.gov/​dockets/​commenting-epa-dockets.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Arnold Lazarus, EPA Region IX, [phone], [e-mail].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Throughout this document, “we,” “us” and “our” refer to the EPA.

Table of Contents

I. The State's Submittal

A. What rules did the State submit?

B. Are there other versions of these rules?

C. What is the purpose of the submitted rule and rule rescission?

II. The EPA's Evaluation and Action

A. How is the EPA evaluating the rule?

B. Do the rule and rule rescission meet the evaluation criteria?

C. The EPA's Recommendations to Further Improve the Rule

D. Public Comment and Proposed Action

III. Incorporation by Reference

IV. Statutory and Executive Order Reviews

I. The State's Submittal

A. What rules did the State submit?

Table 1 lists the rules addressed by this action with the date that they were adopted and repealed by the local air agency and submitted by the California Air Resources Board (CARB).

Table 1—Submitted Rules

Local agency	Rule No.	Rule title	Adopted/ amended	Repealed/ rescinded	Submitted
SDCAPCD	67.12	Polyester Resin Operations	5/15/1996	5/11/2016	8/22/16
SDCAPCD	67.12.1	Polyester Resin Operations	5/11/2016		8/22/16

On September 27, 2016, the EPA determined that the submittals for SDCAPCD Rules 67.12 and 67.12.1 met the completeness criteria in 40 CFR part 51 Appendix V, which must be met before formal review by the EPA.

B. Are there other versions of these rules?

There are no previous versions of Rule 67.12.1 in the SIP. We approved Rule 67.12 on March 27, 1997 (62 FR 14639).

C. What is the purpose of the submitted rule and rule rescission?

VOCs help produce ground-level ozone, smog and particulate matter, which harm human health and the environment. Section 110(a) of the CAA requires states to submit regulations that control VOC emissions. Rule 67.12.1, and the rescinded Rule 67.12, control VOCs emitted from polyester resin operations. The EPA's technical support document (TSD) has more information about these rules.

II. The EPA's Evaluation and Action

A. How is the EPA evaluating the rule?

SIP rules must be enforceable (see CAA section 110(a)(2)), must not interfere with applicable requirements concerning attainment and reasonable further progress or other CAA requirements (see CAA section 110(l)), and must not modify certain SIP control requirements in nonattainment areas without ensuring equivalent or greater emissions reductions (see CAA section 193).

Generally, SIP rules must require Reasonably Available Control Technology (RACT) for each category of sources covered by a Control Techniques Guidelines (CTG) document as well as each major source of VOCs in ozone nonattainment areas classified as Moderate or above (see CAA section 182(b)(2)). The SDCAPCD regulates an ozone nonattainment area classified as “Moderate” for the 2008 8-hour ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) (40 CFR 81.305). Rule 67.12.1 regulates activities covered by the CTG titled “Control Techniques Guidelines for Fiberglass Boat Manufacturing Materials,” EPA-453/R-08-004, September 2008. However, none of the sources regulated by Rule 67.12.1 meet the applicability threshold for the Fiberglass Boat Manufacturing CTG.

Guidance and policy documents that we use to evaluate enforceability, revision/relaxation and rule stringency requirements for the applicable criteria pollutants include the following:

1. “State Implementation Plans; General Preamble for the Implementation of Title I of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990” (57 FR 13498, April 16, 1992 and 57 FR 18070, April 28, 1992).

2. “Issues Relating to VOC Regulation Cutpoints, Deficiencies, and Deviations” (“the Bluebook,” U.S. EPA, May 25, 1988; revised January 11, 1990).

3. “Guidance Document for Correcting Common VOC & Other Rule Deficiencies” (“the Little Bluebook”, EPA Region 9, August 21, 2001).

4. “Control Techniques Guidelines for Fiberglass Boat Manufacturing Materials,” EPA-453/R-08-004, September 2008.

B. Do the rule and rule rescission meet the evaluation criteria?

This rule and rule rescission are consistent with the CAA requirements and relevant guidance regarding enforceability, RACT, and SIP relaxations. Based on information provided by the SDCAPCD, the District does not appear to have facilities that are subject to the fiberglass boat manufacturing CTG and therefore the District's RACT analysis for Rule 67.12.1 is not required to address the presumptive RACT limits included in the CTG.^[1] The TSD has more information on our evaluation.

C. The EPA's Recommendations to Further Improve the Rule

The TSD describes additional rule revisions that we recommend for the next time the local agency modifies the rule.

We recommend the SDCAPCD consider adopting a negative declaration for the fiberglass boat manufacturing operations CTG since the District's data indicate it does not have facilities meeting the CTG's applicability threshold of 15 lb/day or 2.7 tpy.

D. Public Comment and Proposed Action

As authorized in section 110(k)(3) of the Act, the EPA proposes to fully approve the submitted rule and rule rescission because they fulfill all relevant requirements. We will accept comments from the public on this proposal until January 19, 2018. If we take final action to approve the submitted rule and rule rescission, our final action will incorporate the rule and rule rescission into the federally enforceable SIP.

III. Incorporation by Reference

In this rule, the EPA is proposing to include in a final EPA rule regulatory text that includes incorporation by reference. In accordance with requirements of 1 CFR 51.5, the EPA is proposing to incorporate by reference the SDCAPCD rule described in Table 1 of this preamble. The EPA has made, and will continue to make, these materials available through www.regulations.gov and at the EPA Region IX Office (please contact the person identified in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section of this preamble for more information).

IV. Statutory and Executive Order Reviews

Under the Clean Air Act, the Administrator is required to approve a SIP submission that complies with the provisions of the Act and applicable federal regulations. 42 U.S.C. 7410(k); 40 CFR 52.02(a). Thus, in reviewing SIP submissions, the EPA's role is to approve state choices, provided that they meet the criteria of the Clean Air Act. Accordingly, this proposed action merely proposes to approve state law as meeting federal requirements and does not impose additional requirements beyond those imposed by state law. For that reason, this proposed action:

• Is not a “significant regulatory action” subject to review by the Office of Management and Budget under Executive Orders 12866 (58 FR 51735, October 4, 1993) and 13563 (76 FR 3821, January 21, 2011);
• is not an Executive Order 13771 (82 FR 9339, February 2, 2017) regulatory action because SIP approvals are exempted under Executive Order 12866;
• does not impose an information collection burden under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act (44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.);
• is certified as not having a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities under the Regulatory Flexibility Act (5 U.S.C. 601 et seq.);
• does not contain any unfunded mandate or significantly or uniquely affect small governments, as described in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995 (Pub. L. 104-4);
• does not have Federalism implications as specified in Executive Order 13132 (64 FR 43255, August 10, 1999);
• is not an economically significant regulatory action based on health or safety risks subject to Executive Order 13045 (62 FR 19885, April 23, 1997);
• is not a significant regulatory action subject to Executive Order 13211 (66 FR 28355, May 22, 2001);
• is not subject to requirements of Section 12(d) of the National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act of 1995 (15 U.S.C. 272 note) because application of those requirements would be inconsistent with the Clean Air Act; and
• does not provide the EPA with the discretionary authority to address disproportionate human health or environmental effects with practical, appropriate, and legally permissible methods under Executive Order 12898 (59 FR 7629, February 16, 1994).

In addition, the SIP is not approved to apply on any Indian reservation land or in any other area where the EPA or an Indian tribe has demonstrated that a tribe has jurisdiction. In those areas of Indian country, the rule does not have tribal implications and will not impose substantial direct costs on tribal governments or preempt tribal law as specified by Executive Order 13175 (65 FR 67249, November 9, 2000).

List of Subjects in 40 CFR Part 52

• Environmental protection
• Air pollution control
• Incorporation by reference
• Intergovernmental relations
• Volatile organic compounds
• Particulate matter

Dated: December 5, 2017.

Alexis Strauss,

Acting Regional Administrator, Region IX.

Footnotes

1.  Email dated July 12, 2017, from Angela Ortega (SDCAPCD) to Arnold Lazarus (USEPA), RE: “RE: Response to EPA regarding Rule 67.12.1 06_30_17 revised.docx” with attachment. See Table 1. “Summary of Total Emission Reduction.”