AQMD Reveals New Plan to Reduce Smog
The Southland’s air quality agency unveiled its newest formula for cleaning up smoggy skies Friday, kicking off a months-long effort by industry and environmentalists to gauge the impact on the region’s economy and public health and to lobby for changes.
The 61-point draft plan details which manufacturers and other pollution sources in the Los Angeles Basin--from aerospace giants to neighborhood auto body shops--would face new smog control rules and which would escape them over the next 15 years.
The South Coast Air Quality Management District was required by federal law to revise its anti-smog program in order to come up with a strategy for fighting particulates and to update its steps to clean up ozone. Debate over who won and who lost in the new plan began immediately.
“It’s a much better plan. It’s much more practical,” said Robert Wyman, a Los Angeles attorney representing an influential coalition of oil, aerospace and other major manufacturers. “The good news is that we have a lot more confidence now that with less economic impact we can meet the current clean air goals and that’s a fabulous success story.”
Environmentalists, meanwhile, began gathering forces to oppose the plan’s dropping or weakening of rules and the revised assumptions on how much pollution needs to be eliminated.
“Our biggest concern is that the rules they are keeping are more narrow in scope,” said Gail Ruderman Feuer of the Natural Resources Defense Council, which along with the Coalition for Clean Air has led environmentalists analyzing the smog plan. “They are rolling back some of the key ones.”
The AQMD staff decided to abandon 12 measures included in its 1994 plan but never implemented, saying fewer emission reductions are needed than thought to achieve national health standards for two major pollutants--ozone and particulates. Twenty-four other proposals were shelved or included only as contingency measures.
After a series of public meetings, the AQMD board could make changes and is expected to adopt a final plan in late October or early November.
Although many companies in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties are relieved, thousands would still be targeted by the 61 measures that the AQMD staff recommends adopting over the next five years and implementing by 2010.
“We are quite pleased with the progress,” said Ron Lamb, a vice president of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce. “Balance, quite frankly, is what we are looking for. We’re hoping the rules are dealt with in a way that improves air quality but also means we can continue to do business in this region.”
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In their most far-reaching conclusion, AQMD officials decided that no extra cleanup effort is needed for particulates. The staff concluded that proposals for reducing ozone by 2010 will also remove sufficient particulates without added controls on vehicles and industries. However, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in November will propose setting new, tougher national health standards for both pollutants that are expected to require substantially more smog-fighting steps in the Los Angeles region.
The new clean air plan reflects an attempt by the AQMD--which has faced intense political pressure to ease up on business--to peel away layers of regulations that many critics have called too costly or impractical.
Regulations in the 1994 plan that were shelved in the new draft cover pollution sources such as airport ground equipment, bakeries, auto dealerships, rubber product manufacturing, graphic arts businesses, aerospace assembly, boat fueling and painting and wine and malt beverage operations.
James Lents, the AQMD’s executive officer, said he recommended the removal of what he called “marginal” proposals because “they either cost too much per ton of reduction or they’re so small that it’s not worth it now even fooling with them.”
Also deleted were four of the AQMD’s most unpopular proposals--requiring schools, shopping centers, arenas and other large public gathering places to reduce trips through car-pooling efforts and other incentives. Business leaders and legislators had criticized them as ineffective and expensive.
“It’s not just political infeasibility,” Wyman said. “There’s just very little that a business can do, whether they are a retailer or a school, to change the driving patterns of their customers.”
As priorities in smog cleanup, the new plan targets businesses that use oil-based cleaning solvents, adhesives and paints--such as electronics firms, auto mechanics, machine shops and printers--as well as restaurant charbroilers and metal parts companies.
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Business groups have not yet analyzed the measures closely enough to form stances yet, but they were pleased that some proposals, especially those aimed at shopping malls and small industries, were removed.
“Small businesses like bakeries in particular are vulnerable to the vicissitudes of the economy and [the rules] could have unintentionally put people out of business,” Lamb said.
The agency says it is easing measures because the region’s smog-forming emissions dropped 650 tons per day--or 20%--between 1990 and 1993. AQMD officials contend that existing smog controls on cars, factories and other sources have worked better than planned.
Also, a new AQMD computer model showed that the Southland’s air can carry more tons of emissions without violating health standards than believed.
The environmental groups are especially opposed to the AQMD relying on a large category of vague, undefined steps for cutting emissions from vehicles and industry after 2005. Feuer said the AQMD is depending on “a hope and a prayer” that new, cleaner technologies will emerge rather than taking concrete steps to ensure they do.
AQMD board Chairman Jon Mikels, in a recent meeting, predicted that his board “will be facing an easier time” than two years ago, when business and civic leaders objected strenuously to much of the staff’s plan.
