LegiStorm

Summary:

The 1990 Clean Air Act (CAA) amendments required major industrial sources of air pollutants to obtain operating permits. These permits, authorized in Title V of the act, are intended to enhance environmental compliance by detailing for each covered facility all of the emission control requirements to which it is subject. Title V also was intended to generate permit fees that would be used by state and local permitting authorities for administering the program. Implementation of these requirements affects more than 15,000 industrial sources of air emissions, as well as state and local air pollution control agencies. Adding these provisions to the act was controversial, and implementation, too, has generated controversies. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued regulations to implement Title V in 1992. Aspects of those rules (particularly concerning procedures to modify permits) have been contentious since then. EPA has considered a number of regulatory revisions but has not finalized any modifications. However, EPA has issued white papers and a number of formal and informal guidance documents that, together with the 1992 rules, comprise the agency's current interpretation of statutory and regulatory requirements. Because of regulatory and program approval delays, state and local agencies were slow to begin issuing Title V permits, falling far short of statutory deadlines and EPA's goals. As of March 2000, for example, less than 45% of all required Title V permits had been issued. According to an EPA Inspector General report, key factors that delayed issuance of permits included insufficient state resources, complex EPA rules and limited guidance, and conflicting state priorities. Now, however, 99% of all required original permits have been issued, and permit reissuance (required after five years) and modification have replaced issuance of initial permits as the major ongoing task of permitting agencies. Attention to the Title V program increased in 2010 when EPA initiated several controversial regulatory actions to regulate emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) under existing CAA authority with implications for Title V permits. For Title V, these actions mean including GHG control requirements in Title V permits issued for non-GHG. To minimize the costs and administrative burden of its GHG regulations, EPA issued a "Tailoring Rule" to impose requirements only on the largest sources of GHG emissions. In June 2014, the Supreme Court found that EPA exceeded its statutory authority in issuing the Tailoring Rule but upheld the agency's authority to require sources that already need permits for conventional pollutant emissions to comply with CAA requirements for GHGs. Most stakeholders agree that at least some of the benefits of Title V identified by Congress in the 1990 CAA amendments have been achieved, such as incorporation of applicable air pollution control requirements in a single document that is accessible to regulators, the public, and industrial sources. At the same time, there also is widespread dissatisfaction with the program's complexity, costs, and confusing requirements. Many believe that a lack of EPA guidance and oversight has contributed greatly to implementation problems. Congressional examination of Title V has been limited to a few oversight hearings, most recently in 2000. Clean Air Act issues have been of considerable interest during the 113th Congress, especially scrutiny of EPA's regulation of greenhouse gas emissions. Although EPA's actions concerning GHGs involve multiple provisions of the act, this congressional attention has not included Title V.