Adequacy Status of the Truckee Meadows (Washoe County, NV)
Submitted Carbon Monoxide Maintenance Plan for Transportation
Conformity Purposes
[Federal Register: March 15, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 50)]
[Notices]
[Page 13386-13387]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr15mr06-106]
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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
[EPA-R09-OAR-2006-0137; FRL-8044-8]
Adequacy Status of the Truckee Meadows (Washoe County, NV)
Submitted Carbon Monoxide Maintenance Plan for Transportation
Conformity Purposes
AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
ACTION: Notice of adequacy determination.
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SUMMARY: In this notice, EPA is notifying the public that we have found
that the motor vehicle emissions budgets contained in the submitted
Redesignation Request and Maintenance Plan for the Truckee Meadows
(Washoe County, Nevada) Carbon Monoxide Nonattainment Area (September
2005) (``Truckee Meadows Carbon Monoxide Redesignation Request and
Maintenance Plan'') are adequate for transportation conformity
purposes. As a result of our finding, the Washoe County Regional
Transportation Commission and the U.S. Department of Transportation
must use the carbon monoxide motor vehicle emissions budgets from the
submitted plan for future conformity determinations.
DATES: This determination is effective March 30, 2006.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: The finding is available at EPA's
conformity Web site: http://www.epa.gov/oms/traq, (once there, click on
the ``Transportation and Air Quality Planning'' link and click on the
``Transportation Conformity'' link, then look for ``Adequacy Review of
SIP Submissions for Conformity''). You may also contact Eleanor Kaplan,
U.S. EPA, Region IX, Air Division AIR-2, 75 Hawthorne Street, San
Francisco, CA 94105; (415) 947-4147, or kaplan.eleanor@epa.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Throughout this document, whenever ``we'',
``us'', or ``our'' is used, we mean EPA.
This notice announces our finding that the emissions budgets
contained in the Carbon Monoxide State Implementation Plan revision for
Truckee Meadows (Washoe County, Nevada) (``Truckee Meadows Carbon
Monoxide Redesignation Request and Maintenance Plan'') submitted by the
State of Nevada on November 4, 2005, are adequate for transportation
conformity purposes. EPA Region IX made this finding in a letter to the
Nevada Division of Environmental Protection on February 13, 2006. We
are also announcing this finding on our conformity Web site: http://
www.epa.gov/oms/traq, (once there, click on the ``Transportation and
Air Quality Planning'' link and click on the ``Transportation
Conformity'' link, then look for ``Adequacy Review of SIP Submissions
for Conformity'').
Transportation conformity is required by section 176(c) of the
Clean Air Act. Our conformity rule requires that transportation plans,
programs, and projects conform to state air quality implementation
plans (SIPs) and establishes the criteria and procedures for
determining whether or not they do. Conformity to a SIP means that
transportation activities will not produce new air quality violations,
worsen existing violations, or delay timely attainment of the national
ambient air quality standards.
The criteria by which we determine whether a SIP's motor vehicle
emissions
[[Page 13387]]
budgets are adequate for conformity purposes are outlined in 40 CFR
93.118(e)(4). One of these criteria is that the motor vehicle emissions
budgets, when considered together with all other emission sources, are
consistent with applicable requirements for reasonable further
progress, attainment, or maintenance (whichever is relevant to the
given implementation plan submission). We have preliminarily determined
that the Truckee Meadows Carbon Monoxide Redesignation Request and
Maintenance Plan does provide for maintenance of the CO standard.
Therefore, the motor vehicle emissions budgets can be found adequate.
Please note that an adequacy review is separate from EPA's completeness
review, and it also should not be used to prejudge EPA's ultimate
action on the submitted plan itself. Even if we find a budget adequate,
the submitted plan could later be disapproved.
We have described our process for determining the adequacy of
submitted SIP budgets in guidance (May 14, 1999 memo titled
``Conformity Guidance on Implementation of March 2, 1999 Conformity
Court Decision''). This guidance is now reflected in the amended
transportation conformity rule, July 1, 2004 (69 FR 40004), and in the
correction notice, July 20, 2004 (69 FR 43325). We followed this
process in making our adequacy determination on the emissions budgets
contained in the Truckee Meadows Carbon Monoxide Redesignation Request
and Maintenance Plan.
Authority: 42 U.S.C. 7401-7671q.
Dated: February 21, 2006.
Jane Diamond,
Acting Regional Administrator, Region IX.
[FR Doc. E6-3729 Filed 3-14-06; 8:45 am]
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