Too Soft on Diesels

A little drama unfolded in Washington the other day as Lee M. Thomas prepared to make one of his first major decisions as chief of the Environmental Protection Agency. It involved new air-pollution-control standards for buses and trucks, including those powered by diesel engines.

David A. Stockman, director of the Office of Management and Budget, had some concerns that the proposed rules were too tough on industry, and let it be known that he would visit Thomas to “discuss” them. Aha, said Washington insiders who worry about such things, here is a real test of Thomas’ ability to run EPA independently of the heavy hand of the White House. As we know from past dramas at EPA, Stockman’s office had used its budget-making and regulatory-review authority to keep the agency on a short leash.

But the drama quickly fizzled in this instance, Stockman went back to OMB, and Thomas issued the order as he had planned. The logical conclusion seemed to be that Thomas stared Stockman in the eye and told him that there would be no compromising the nation’s health and environment.

What happened, in fact, was that EPA issued standards that were years late in coming--and inadequate at that. They were scaled back, even, from a slightly more stringent set proposed last fall by EPA and attacked by the California Air Resources Board as too weak. For instance, EPA proposed last fall a rule that would require particulate emissions from diesel trucks to be limited by 1990 to 0.25 gram per horsepower for each hour of operation. The California board said that emissions could be cut to 0.10 gram by then. The EPA standard adopted Friday stayed with 0.25 gram, and it does not have to be achieved until 1991. The standard that California says is possible now will not go into effect until 1994.

It tool EPA eight years to comply with Congress’ mandate for truck and bus standards needed to cleanse diesel exhaust of the worst health dangers of soot and grime. Even then it had to be done under court order. More years will pass before the new rules have any effect.

In the meantime the average motorist is paying his share of cleaning up auto exhaust. And industry continues under pressure to help meet clean-air goals in polluted areas like the Los Angeles Basin--at greater cost than truck and bus control. The trucks and buses? They spew, and we fume.