The AQMD of the Los Angeles voted to postpone a vote to kill almost all jobs in Southern California. Good thinking. The Obama Administration created new Federal air standard, to kill off what is left of manufacturing in this country, along with many other industries. Los Angeles was about to sign its death warrant by agreeing to a 50% cut in “smog” (based on junk science. The good news is that President Trump is rapidly killing off the Obama Administration hate Americans legislation.
“The board decided, 9-3, to delay acting on the plan until its March 3 meeting after board members proposed significant changes at the last minute. Another reasons cited by board members for the postponement was the absence of board member Clark E. Parker Sr., who had worked on the plan for four years but was absent due to a family funeral.
The plan, which would bring the district in line with federal standards, has drawn opposition from different groups. Environmentalists, who staged a protest outside the agency’s headquarters in Diamond Bar on Friday, say the plan doesn’t ask enough of industry. Meanwhile, industry groups say it underestimates the costs of cutting pollution and would damage the economy.
We should expect by March 3, Trump will have done what is necessary to make the EPA use science instead of radical rhetoric as the basis of standards. Even if not completed by then, the AQMD should wait till Washington fixies the Obama suicide regulations.
AQMD postpones vote on how to cut smog by nearly 50 percent in 7 years
Emily Guerin, KPCC, 2/3/17
A vote on a controversial plan intended to cut smog-forming emissions in Southern California nearly in half by 2023 was postponed on Friday by the governing board of the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
The board decided, 9-3, to delay acting on the plan until its March 3 meeting after board members proposed significant changes at the last minute. Another reasons cited by board members for the postponement was the absence of board member Clark E. Parker Sr., who had worked on the plan for four years but was absent due to a family funeral.
The plan, which would bring the district in line with federal standards, has drawn opposition from different groups. Environmentalists, who staged a protest outside the agency’s headquarters in Diamond Bar on Friday, say the plan doesn’t ask enough of industry. Meanwhile, industry groups say it underestimates the costs of cutting pollution and would damage the economy.
Before we get into the substance of the plan, let’s address a few basics.
Why is our air so bad?
Greater Los Angeles has long had the worst smog, technically known as ozone, in the United States.
Longtime residents probably remember the days when the San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountains were constantly hazy and it hurt to breathe. Since then, ozone levels have dropped by over 40 percent.
But they’re still bad: a third of the time, there is at least one air quality monitoring station in the basin that has unhealthy levels of ozone.
Ozone forms when sunlight bakes emissions from cars, heavy-duty trucks, refineries, construction equipment, the ports and some natural sources, like trees.
The L.A. Basin, with over 18 million people and the busiest ports in the country, has no shortage of emission sources. It also receives nearly 300 days a year of sunshine. The air here is also unusually stagnant thanks to the mountains, which can trap the air and create temperature inversions.
What are regulators doing about it?
Working with the state and the federal government, the AQMD has done a lot of things over the years, including requiring catalytic converters on cars and power plants, vapor recovery systems on nozzles at gas stations, dust control at factories and even a different blend of gasoline.
But now, AQMD says it has gone almost as far as it can with emissions cuts from “stationary sources,” in the region, like refineries, power plants, etc.
What remains are emissions from mobile sources like cars, trucks, trains and ships. These contribute 88 percent of the smog-forming emissions in greater Los Angeles.
In its plan, AQMD is proposing a suite of incentives to speed the transition to clean transportation – ones that will cost approximately a billion dollars a year. The idea is that through these incentives, people can be persuaded to abandon older, polluting vehicles faster than through regulations alone (and they won’t get tied up in court).
In addition, the agency is planning on asking the California Air Resources Board and the federal Environmental Protection Agency for a new ultra-low emission standard for heavy duty trucks. Without it, AQMD says it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to meet federal ozone standards. The Obama EPA agreed to begin the rule-making process in December, and a spokesman for the Trump EPA says so far, there hasn’t been a change to that plan.
AQMD is also hoping that through voluntary conversations with some of the largest emitters of smog forming pollutants – the ports and warehousing industries – they can agree on emissions reductions.
Phil Fine, AQMD’s deputy executive director, stressed that by working with polluters, they can cut emissions faster than by regulating them.
“But if the collaborative relationship is not working, we still need the emission reductions, [so] we’ll immediately pivot and recommend to our board some [regulations],” he said.
What do environmentalists say about the plan?
Environmental groups like the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Earthjustice say the agency has not done everything it can to clean up the air. They don’t think AQMD has gone as far as it can with stationary sources, and point out that refineries in the South Coast by and large have not installed the latest pollution controls, something they blame their being apart of an emissions trading program called RECLAIM and not subject to top down regulations.
In addition, they argue the AQMD does have the legal authority to regulate emissions from ports and warehouses and should use it. They don’t like the agency’s proposal to begin discussions about how to cut emissions from these sources; rather, they want the agency to require them to make deep cuts.
Finally they worry about where all that incentive money will come from, and what the agency will do if they don’t get the money.
“We have absolutely no idea if any of those measures will come in or not,” David Pettit, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the AQMD board in January. “You can’t calculate the odds.”
What do industry and business say about the plan?
Industry groups also worry about where the incentive money will come from.
Some of the possible sources are new property or sales taxes, and vehicle registration and cargo container fees, all of which they say would damage the region’s economy, according to a comment letter sent to AQMD by the Los Angeles County Business Federation.
The logistics industry in particular is nervous that AQMD’s proposal to begin talks with the ports and warehouses will result in an emissions cap – something environmentalists want, but something those businesses have long resisted. The ports point to their own successes reducing pollution through initiatives like the Clean Truck Program, which turned over the entire truck fleet at the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles and cut diesel particulate matter emissions by 85 percent between 2005 and 2015.
The Western States Petroleum Association also objects to a proposal to scrap RECLAIM (Regional Clean Air Incentives Market), the market-based emissions trading program they participate in, in favor of traditional top-down regulation.
And the Southern California Leadership Council asked AQMD to push back against “unrealistic state and federal mandates” that require AQMD to ask for such strict emissions reductions.
What does AQMD say about the plan?
AQMD staff say they are hopeful that this plan will actually help them meet federal air quality standards.
“If we can raise this funding, it’s not only possible, it will happen,” Phil Fine, AQMD’s deputy executive officer, told KPCC in November.
They say technology has advanced to the point where there are clean, low-emission vehicles on the market today that will allow for huge reductions in emissions that weren’t possible in the past – if they can incentivize people to switch over to them.
They say if they don’t get the money, they can do what they’ve done in the past: rely on a provision of the Clean Air Act called the “black box” that allows them to be vague about how they will cut emissions rather than itemizing where the cuts will come from and how much they will cost. But that’s something they’d like to avoid.
The AQMD board begins discussing the plan today at 9:00 am and is expected to vote this afternoon.
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