Adequacy Status of Motor Vehicle Budgets in Submitted State
Implementation Plan for Transportation Conformity Purposes;
Pennsylvania; Revised Attainment Plan for Pennsylvania Portion of the
Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone Nonattainment Area
[Federal Register: May 28, 2003 (Volume 68, Number 102)]
[Notices]
[Page 31700]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr28my03-56]
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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
[FRL-7503-6]
Adequacy Status of Motor Vehicle Budgets in Submitted State
Implementation Plan for Transportation Conformity Purposes;
Pennsylvania; Revised Attainment Plan for Pennsylvania Portion of the
Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone Nonattainment Area
AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
ACTION: Notice of adequacy status.
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SUMMARY: EPA is announcing that the motor vehicle emission budgets
(budgets) for Philadelphia, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Bucks
Counties contained in the revised 2005 Attainment Plan (Plan) are
adequate for transportation conformity purposes. The Plan was submitted
to EPA by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection
(PADEP) as a State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision on January 17,
2003. EPA has found that the Plan's budgets for those five counties,
which comprise the Pennsylvania portion of the Philadelphia-Wilmington-
Trenton Ozone Nonattainment Area, are adequate for transportation
conformity purposes.
DATES: The findings that the budgets are adequate were made in a letter
dated April 24, 2003 from EPA Region III to the PADEP. These adequacy
findings are effective on June 12, 2003.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Larry Budney, U.S. EPA, Region III,
1650 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103 at (215) 814-2184 or by e-mail
at budney.larry@epa.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Throughout this document ``we,'' `` us,'' or
``our'' refer to EPA. The word ``budgets'' refers to the motor vehicle
emission budgets for volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and nitrogen
oxides (NOX). The word ``SIP'' in this document refers to
the revised Attainment Plan for the Pennsylvania portion of the
Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone Nonattainment Area submitted to
EPA as a SIP revision on January 17, 2003.
On March 2, 1999, the D.C. Circuit Court ruled that budgets
contained in submitted SIPs cannot be used for conformity
determinations until EPA has affirmatively found them adequate. On
January 17, 2003, PADEP formally submitted a SIP revision to EPA
consisting of a revised 2005 Attainment Plan (Plan) for the
Pennsylvania portion of the Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone
Nonattainment Area (Philadelphia, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and
Bucks Counties). On February 25, 2003, we posted the availability of
the Plan and the budgets for Southeast Pennsylvania on our conformity
Web site for the purpose of soliciting public comment on the adequacy
of the budgets. EPA's public comment period closed on March 27, 2003.
We did not receive any comments.
On April 24, 2003, EPA Region III sent a letter to PADEP that
constituted final Agency action on the adequacy of the budgets
contained in the Plan submitted by PADEP. That action was EPA's
findings that the Plan's budgets for Philadelphia, Chester, Delaware,
Montgomery and Bucks Counties are adequate for transportation
conformity purposes. As a result of our April 24, 2003 findings, the
revised Plan budgets contained in Pennsylvania's January 17, 2003 SIP
submittal for Philadelphia, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Bucks
Counties (the Pennsylvania portion of the Philadelphia-Wilmington-
Trenton Ozone Nonattainment Area) may be used for future conformity
determinations.
This is an announcement of adequacy findings that we already made
on April 24, 2003. The effective date of these findings is June 12,
2003. These findings will also be announced on EPA's Web site: http://
www.epa.gov/otaq/transp.htm (once there, click on the ``Conformity''
button). The Web site will contain a detailed analysis of our adequacy
findings.
Transportation conformity is required by section 176 of the Clean
Air Act. EPA's conformity rule requires that transportation plans,
programs, and projects conform to SIPs and establishes the criteria and
procedures for determining whether or not they do so. 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 budgets are adequate for
conformity purposes are outlined in 40 CFR 93.118 (e) (4) through (5).
On July 28, 2000, EPA proposed (65 FR 46383) to clarify its
December 16, 1999 proposal to approve or conditionally approve and
disapprove in the alternative attainment demonstration SIPs for ten
areas, including the Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone
Nonattainment area, (64 FR 70317). In that proposal we stated that even
though the approved SIP would contain budgets, once we found newly
revised budgets based on MOBILE6 adequate, they would apply instead of
the previously approved budgets. In the October 26, 2001 approval (66
FR 54143) of the attainment demonstration for the Pennsylvania portion
of the Philadelphia-Wilmington-Trenton Ozone Nonattainment area we
approved that proposal. Therefore, this adequacy finding will allow the
replacement of the mobile budgets in the one-hour ozone SIP previously
approved by EPA.
Please note that this adequacy finding for the mobile budgets for
the revised SIP is separate from EPA's completeness determination of
the revised SIP submission, and separate from EPA's action to approve
or disapprove the revised SIP. Even though we have found these budgets
adequate and they are replacing the previously approved mobile budgets,
the revised mobile budgets contained in the revised SIP still have to
be approved or disapproved.
Dated: May 7, 2003.
James W. Newsom,
Acting Regional Administrator, Region III.
[FR Doc. 03-13253 Filed 5-27-03; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6560-50-P