National Helail Merchants Association ...ma 1000 Connecticut Avenue, N W. February 18, 1977 The Honorable Robert Stafford United States Senate Dear Senator Stafford: On behalf of A. Robert Stevenson, who represented the National Retail Merchants Association at hearings held by the Subcommittee on Environmental Pollution on February 11, 1977, I am herewith submitting NRMA's responses to questions submitted to us by you concerning our position on amendments to the Clean Air Act. The retail industry has a vital interest in the proposed amendments, and we appreciated the opportunity to appear before the Subcommittee and to respond to these questions. If you or your staff need further information about NRMA or our position on this issue, please contact Bruce H. Turnbull, Legislative Counsel to NRMA, in our Washington office at 223-8250. Thank you for your time and consideration. QUESTIONS FOR PANEL OF DEVELOPERS 1. Gentlemen, it would be very helpful to the Committee to have information showing the relationship between compliance with statutory auto standards and the need for indirect source and transportation controls. Does any of you have data to show how relaxation of auto standards has or will necessitate imposition of other control measures? 2. Several of you have questioned the technical basis for EPA's current indirect source regulation. You have pointed to studies commissioned by EPA to buttress you claims that the regulations are not always well-founded. Does this show that the problems with indirect source reviews are being dealt with by the agency? Why shouldn't EPA have the authority to deal with problems as they become evident? 3. The purpose of the Clean Air Act is to protect public health and welfare. Isn't it contrary to this goal to pretend that autos have attained 1975 and 1976 statutory standards and refuse to require the best clean-up we can achieve in spite of delays in automobile technology? National Retail Merchants Association TIRM 1000 Connecticut Avenue, N.W February 18, 1977 RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS POSED BY SENATOR ROBERT STAFFORD, SUB- 1. This question presupposes that the implementation of other procedures relating to indirect source regulations could pick up where the relaxation of auto emission standards leaves off. This is a basic operating assumption which is faulty at best. The basic assumption which the EPA used for introducing Parking Management Regulations is the desire "to reduce the areawide growth of Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) so as to contribute to achievement of photochemical oxidant and/or carbon monoxide standards."1 A study conducted by the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) on the effects of Parking Management Regulations concluded that no direct nor consistent relationship necessarily exists between VMT reduction and either primary or secondary ambient A study by the National Academy of Sciences, pollution levels.2 National Academy of Engineers on air quality and auto emissions indicates that there are substantial problems with respect to the measuring and modeling of the many variables affecting areawide air quality.3 Furthermore, a study by Dabbert and Sandys These of SRI indicates that the implementation of VMT procedures could possible result in the deterioration of air quality.4 studies tend to indicate that the imposition of indirect source controls has proceeded without any significant scientific basis. The Annual Report of the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to the Congress on Progress in the Prevention and Control of Air Pollution in 1975 found that some 69 Air Quality Control Regions were reporting violations of the carbon monoxide standard. That same report found that "[o]nce Federal Motor Vehicle Emission Standards are fully implemented, the CO standard is expected to be attained in all but a few areas of the nation." Since transportation and indirect source controls are the alternatives utilized when automobile emission standards are not sufficient to attain the air quality standards, it follows that the delays beyond the original 1975 attainment date for the emission standards have caused a corresponding increase in the imposition of transportation and indirect source regulations in nearly 69 Air Quality Control Regions of the country. Federal Register, 39, 164, page 30440. 2M. Roddin, W. Dabbert, R. Sandys and others, Phase I Final Report, February 18, J. 2. EPA has interpreted court decisions to require them to impose some kind of indirect source controls despite the findings in studies commissioned by that agency. This is paradoxical, but it is nevertheless the case. The provision favored by NRMA--Section 120 of S. 253--would allow EPA to require states and localities to institute indirect source controls where they are necessary to attain the primary air quality standards assuming that the automobile emission standards had been met on the schedule contained in the 1970 Act. EPA would identify the types of indirect source controls that are effective in reducing pollution levels in particular circumstances, and these controls would be imposed by the states and localities. NRMA believes that this constitutes an appropriate grant of authority to EPA to "deal with problems as they become evident." Section 120 of S. 253 would not eliminate all controls on indirect sources. It would, rather, impose only those which are necessary and effective. 3. NRMA and others have brought forward to the Subcommittee and the Congress numerous studies showing that indirect source controls are not in fact effective in reducing pollution levels. There is, therefore, substantial doubt that these controls are "the best clean up we can achieve in spite of delays in automobile technology. Further, the EPA Report to Congress cited in response to Question 1 above indicated that the carbon monoxide standard would be met in most of the country when the automobile emission standards are in fact achieved. NRMA supports the requirements in Section 120 of S. 253 which would impose indirect source controls in those areas of the country that would not achieve the air quality standards when the automobile emission standards are attained. 3National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, September 1974, Serial Number 93-24, Volume 3, "The Relationship of Emission to Ambient Air Quality.' 4Dabbert and Sandys, March 1974, Report #2947, "Assessment of the Air Quality Impact of Indirect Sources," SRI, Menlo Park, Calif. |