Subject: TEA 3 and CAA collide ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --- Uproar over environmental provisions in EPW bill reignites Brian Stempeck, Environment & Energy Daily reporter A first look at the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee's six-year transportation bill -- slated for a markup next week -- reveals that it does not contain some of the most controversial Clean Air Act provisions found in earlier drafts, but environmental groups are sounding the alarm over some of the other changes the bill makes in the way of transportation planning. Although interest groups were still sifting through the 500-page bill yesterday, several controversial provisions had emerged as of last night. "It's not a pretty picture," said Michael Replogle, transportation director for Environmental Defense. "There are certainly some good things in this bill, but there are a lot of serious weakenings of environmental laws." EPW Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) followed the Bush administration's lead in drafting transportation planning procedures that alter the process to make it less cumbersome for state and metropolitan area officials. State officials would use the plans to "demonstrate conformity," proving to the Transportation Department and U.S. EPA that emissions from the transportation sector will not exceed allowable emissions under broader state air quality plans. If states fail to demonstrate conformity, they can only use federal funding for projects that will not adversely affect air quality, such as safety or mass transit programs. Inhofe's proposal would require a 10-year, long-term transportation plan, instead of the currently required 20-year plan, with updates required every four years instead of every two years. The bill also allows state officials to move forward with projects during a conformity lapse, as long as they use nonfederal funds. "It defies the whole point of conformity," said Emily Figdor, clean air advocate for U.S. Public Interest Research Group. "There's definitely the potential that you're going to undermine your air quality plans." "It really hampers the way conformity works," said Deron Lovaas, deputy director of the smart growth and transportation program at Natural Resources Defense Council. "It pretty severely weakens that part of the Clean Air Act." State transportation planners have had difficulty with air quality compliance, according to the General Accounting Office. In a May GAO report, 56 of 159 transportation planning areas had conformity lapses during the last six years due to several factors. Officials told GAO that two factors were to blame -- a lack of time and resources and "difficulty designing a transportation plan that would control future emissions enough to meet their budget." Highway groups contacted yesterday said they had not finished reviewing the environmental sections of the bill, but applauded the sections streamlining environmental reviews of major road projects. "It looks like good progress has been made on expediting delivery of projects and making rational decisions on a timely basis," said Bill Buff, spokesman for the American Highway Users Alliance. A report from AHUA said that highway construction could actually help improve air quality. By adding more highway capacity to the 18 worst bottlenecks in the country, "emissions of smog-causing volatile organic compounds would drop by 44 percent, while carbon monoxide would be reduced by 45 percent," the report found. "The package that's out there is one we've agreed to," said a Democratic EPW aide, who confirmed that Democrats had agreed to the changes in the transportation planning process. Another major change is that the bill contains language that would allow money from the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement (CMAQ) program on alternative fuels, the aide noted. Two of the most controversial provisions in EPW drafts that circulated last summer are not in the bill, the aide said. One provision in earlier EPW draf ts would have expanded the definition of "exceptional events" that allow a state to disregard air quality monitoring data used to determine compliance with national standards. That provision is severely narrowed in the final bill, the aide said. Nor does the bill include sections from the earlier GOP drafts that would put into statute EPA's recent effort to create "early action compacts,"which allow communities currently in compliance with the existing one-hour ozone standard but expected to be in violation of the new eight-hour threshold to enter a special category outside of the implementation boundaries facing the rest of the country. "The early action compacts aren't included in the bill," Figdor said. "That's definitely good news." But Replogle said the bill gives the EPA administrator too much flexibility when it comes to determining whether transportation conformity plans meet the new eight-hour standards. That flexibility goes hand in hand with EPA's proposal last week to expand its criteria for state and regional transportation planners as they try to meet the new national air quality standards for smog and soot, he said. "Some items that we have objected to strenuously have been removed," Lovaas said. "However, we're still talking with staff to figure out how this is going to hold up in markup and whether or not it's guaranteed in conference." "It's a pretty flawed product," Lovaas said. "We're not jumping up and down about it." - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Make your voice heard! 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