L.A. Gains Concession on Anti-Smog Rules : Pollution: AQMD proposes to remove stringent measures for airplanes, trucks, trains and ships from plan to be submitted to U.S. Action is designed to buy time to seek more economical alternatives.

In a major concession to Los Angeles, regional air quality officials devised a proposal Tuesday that would remove stringent anti-smog measures for airplanes, trucks, trains and ships from a sweeping clean-air plan to be submitted to the federal government.

Under the proposal presented by Henry Wedaa, chairman of the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the expensive and highly controversial measures targeting diesel engines would remain in the Los Angeles region’s 20-year smog plan.

But they would not be included in the version sent to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for approval, which means the AQMD is not committing to implement them. That flexibility would give the AQMD and the city of Los Angeles a few more years to search for more economical alternatives.

Christopher O’Donnell, a city legislative analyst, endorsed the compromise, calling it “the best way to expedite the issue at this time.” While it would allow Southern California to meet a federal deadline for its smog plan, the compromise would not commit the area to measures that would have “a disastrous impact on the region’s economy,” he said.

The AQMD board will meet Friday to decide the fate of the sweeping smog plan. Last month, the board unanimously postponed a decision until then so that an eleventh-hour strategy by Mayor Richard Riordan’s staff could be hastily analyzed.

The AQMD plan, designed to meet health standards in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties by 2010, includes more than 100 proposed transportation and industrial measures. It is the AQMD’s third update, required under federal law, in five years.

Also on Friday, the AQMD board will tackle an extraordinary proposal from local elected officials at the Southern California Assn. of Governments. The group has recommended that the AQMD incorporate in its plan a tax on motorists that would amount to 3 to 5 cents per mile driven--equivalent to about $1 per gallon.

Arnold Sherwood, SCAG director of forecasting, said the tax would have to be set by the Legislature and would replace current gasoline taxes that amount to about 2.5 cents per mile. He said it would bring in about $5 billion a year to fund mass transit and other transportation improvements.

Wedaa, however, predicted Tuesday that his board would never push for such a tax and that “it’s obvious that the Legislature would never do it.”

Meanwhile, the proposed compromise strategy with the mayor is much less aggressive in reducing nitrogen oxides, a pollutant mostly from diesel-powered vehicles that contributes to the basin’s notorious ozone pollution, its brown haze and its particulates, which are small pieces of carbon soot and dust that lodge in lungs and cause respiratory disease.

At stake are measures that would eliminate about 270 tons of nitrogen oxides, or NOx, each day. Under the mayor’s strategy, 50% of NOx would be removed from the region’s air--or 540 tons a day--compared to 79% under the AQMD’s original plan.

In particular, the city wants much less stringent rules for the region’s airports, trains, ships and heavy-duty trucks. The trucking and airline industries have been vocal opponents of the rules, saying they would be forced to slash flights and the hauling of goods to and from the region. Riordan and local business leaders say the measures would drive up costs so much that shippers and other interstate commerce would move business to other major cities and ports such as Seattle and San Diego.

Implementing the AQMD’s entire plan would cost business and consumers in the four counties $5.4 billion a year through 2010, according to the AQMD’s economic report. The mayor’s office says its strategy could cut that loss by $3.2 billion a year.

City staff members have suggested that instead of tough controls on the urban transportation sources, particulates could be tackled in future years by looking for additional ways to eliminate natural dust that blows into the air from unpaved roads and lots, particularly in San Bernardino County. That has upset many Inland Empire officials, who say that Los Angeles is trying to shift the burden of controlling particulates to them.

Under Wedaa’s strategy, the AQMD would promise to the federal government that it would reduce enough NOx to achieve federal standards for ozone, the main ingredient of smog. But it would take up to two more years allowed under federal law to come up with additional measures to tackle particulates.

“We’re probably just delaying the pain,” Wedaa said in an interview. “But we’re doing it because we have a lack of upfront information. I object to strong rules until we know more.”

Wedaa said he will convene two conferences of experts to try to devise more economical ways to reduce particulates.

Barry Wallerstein, AQMD deputy executive officer, originally was opposed to the mayor’s strategy. But he said Tuesday that deferring the diesel proposals in the version submitted to the EPA will not harm public health because they will remain in the AQMD’s plan.

But environmentalists disagree. They say that without a commitment to the EPA, the measures would carry no weight and would be put on the back burner by the AQMD as well as by the EPA, which is to formulate its own backup clean-air plan for the region by February.

“The city’s real motivation was to send something less aggressive to the EPA,” said Denny Zane of the Coalition for Clean Air. “Now there won’t be a strong target for the EPA.”

Riordan’s aides, however, say the AQMD plan is unworkable, since it relies on technology for clean-burning heavy-duty engines that is yet to be developed.

State Air Resources Board staff members agree. ARB officials said there is no current way to eliminate three-quarters of the NOx in the basin by 2010, as the AQMD proposes.

Under the Clean Air Act, the AQMD and state board have until Nov. 15 to submit a final plan to the EPA that outlines how the Southland will meet health standards for ozone, the main ingredient of smog. If the deadline is missed, the EPA could impose sanctions on the region next year, including a freeze on federal highway funds and bans on new polluting businesses.