Trucking Awaits Effect Of Court's EPA Ruling

The May 14 court ruling that placed federal air quality standards in limbo is unlikely to have any short-term consequences for trucking. But the ramifications could be far-reaching if Congress has to fill in lost regulations -- and that will depend on how the Environmental Protection Agency fares with its probable appeal.

EPA's standards took a blow when a divided U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., voted along party lines to throw out the agency's new limits on ozone and particulate matter.

The three-judge panel called parts of the 1997 smog and soot regulations "arbitrary and capricious" and sent them back to the drawing board for revision.

"At least temporarily, any effort to make those regulations more strict is put on hold. The real question is how will EPA react," said Craig Johnston, professor of environmental law at Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Ore.

The court overturned a new eight-hour ozone measurement standard that would have replaced the current one-hour method. New rules also would have changed the existing ozone standard -- 0.12 parts per million -- to a more stringent standard of 0.085 ppm.

The ruling also threw out EPA's standard of measuring particulate matter smaller than 10 microns in diameter, which had a range from 2.5 to 10 microns.

The agency's options are to appeal the ruling to the full D.C. Circuit Court or -- if that court refuses to hear the case -- the U.S. Supreme Court. Or EPA could simply go back and re-propose rules that will meet the appeals court's demand for more "rational" smog and soot limit criteria.

For the full story, see the May 24 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.