BOARD MEETING DATE: September 5, 2003
AGENDA NO. 29

White Paper on Regulatory Options for Addressing Cumulative Impacts from Air Pollution Emissions

SYNOPSIS:

At its January 2003 meeting, the Board directed staff to develop a White Paper on regulatory options for addressing cumulative impacts from air pollution. As directed, this White Paper was formulated with input from a Working Group composed of representatives from industry and the environmental community. This report fulfills that directive and provides staff’s recommendation for specific actions that could be implemented to address cumulative impacts.

COMMITTEE:

Stationary Source, March 28, July 25, and August 22 2003, and
Mobile Source, August 22, 2003, Reviewed

RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Direct staff to:

1. proceed with the Cumulative Impacts Reduction Strategy (CIRS) outlined in the White Paper;
    
2. report to the Stationary Source and Mobile Source Committees every 6 months on the CIRS progress; and
    
3. report to the Board once per year as part of the report on EJ Enhancements.

Barry R. Wallerstein, D.Env.
Executive Officer

Background

On January 10, 2003, staff reported to the Board on the initial investigation into the development of a cumulative impacts program. This effort is an outgrowth of the September 2002 Environmental Justice (EJ) Enhancements for the FY 2002-03, which included a directive to staff to report back on the feasibility of rulemaking to address cumulative impacts of air toxics beyond current AQMD requirements. Also presented at that meeting was a proposal to develop a White Paper on regulatory and policy options for addressing cumulative impacts from air pollution emissions, including a work plan that entailed creation of a working group, development of a White Paper, and a planned update to the second Multiple Air Toxics Exposure Study (MATES II). The Board directed staff to report back to the Board with a White Paper containing recommendations and schedule.

Addressing cumulative impacts is a very complex issue. AQMD has been on the forefront of air toxics reduction and has several existing and ongoing programs in this area. Staff’s recommendations include 25 specific strategies to enhance the ongoing efforts to address cumulative impacts. The phrase "cumulative air quality impacts" is often used to describe possible health and nuisance impacts potentially related to a given neighborhood’s cumulative emissions from sources that individually comply with AQMD, state, and federal rules.

The purpose of the White Paper is to:

• present a forward-looking comprehensive strategy of how the AQMD intends to identify and further address cumulative impacts of air pollution, so that all communities in the South Coast receive equitable treatment and attention as to their local air quality concerns;
• ensure fair and consistent treatment of local businesses as it carries out this facet of environmental justice; and
• points out potential ways to achieve more substantial progress in public health protection.

The White Paper is a starting point, developed with input from the Cumulative Impacts Working Group, whose members have spent much time and energy in contributing their expert knowledge, experience, and suggestions to this pathfinding effort. Input was also incorporated from five Community Forums held throughout the four-county region in June and July, and numerous local government and community meetings in August.

This White Paper presents staff’s recommendations regarding options for assessing cumulative impacts from sources of air toxics. It includes consideration of input received from the California Air Resources Board (ARB), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), local government representatives, industry, and environmental and community groups on the Working Group, as well as input from community meetings. Key policy issues addressed during the working group process include, but were not limited to, scope of the program (i.e., stationary and/or mobile sources; cancer and/or non-cancer health effects; and including particulate emissions), defining high impact areas for specific actions to reduce cumulative exposures, and potential approaches to address cumulative impacts.

Definitions

For the purposes of developing a program to address cumulative impacts from air pollution emissions, the AQMD staff will rely on the definition of Environmental Justice that was approved by the Governing Board in October 1997:

Environmental Justice means the equitable environmental policymaking and enforcement to protect the health of all persons who live or work in the AQMD, regardless of age, culture, ethnicity, gender, race, socioeconomic status, or geographic location, from the health effects of air pollution.

Under the subject of Environmental Justice, the definition of cumulative impact was extensively discussed by the Working Group. A cumulative impact can be defined in many ways and it is therefore difficult to arrive at a single definition that fits all circumstances. Cumulative impacts can be regional, as well as localized or neighborhood. Reducing emissions throughout the Basin would decrease the overall risk on a regional basis and will lower neighborhood risks by varying degrees, depending on the localized circumstances. The following definition attempts to recognize these view points and develop a working definition.

A cumulative air pollution impact is an adverse health effect, risk or nuisance from exposure to pollutants released into the air from multiple air pollution sources.

Further refinement or variation of this definition may be needed in the future when a specific regulation or policy is formulated. Reference to "air pollution" under this working definition is intended to include not only air toxics, but criteria pollutants, such as particulates, and nuisances (e.g., odors).

CUMULATIVE IMPACT REDUCTION STRATEGY (CIRS)

At the start of the process, staff introduced four design principles that were factored into the working group process:

• no redlining (e.g., defining an acceptable/unacceptable geographical area based on level of risk);
• not interfering with local land use decisions, but making more comprehensive air quality information available to decision makers;
• reasonable decision-making time frame for CEQA analysis and permits; and
• consider resource considerations and regulatory certainty.

Approach

The overall approach in addressing cumulative impacts included several key features:

• Build on existing State Implementation Plan (SIP) Programs that address criteria pollutants;
• Base on existing known information (i.e., MATES II) to address cumulative impacts of air toxics;
• Identify high cumulative impact areas and develop effective solutions accordingly; and
• Continue to develop/refine technical database and tools.

Staff will rely on implementation of the most recently approved AQMP (i.e. 2003) to address criteria pollutants by expeditiously implementing the approved plan. These concepts are incorporated in the individual strategies.

Scope

After consideration of information and comments from the Working Group members and from Community Forums, staff recommends that the scope of the CIRS include:

• Cancer risk;
• Hazard Index from non-cancer risk sources;
• Odors; and
• Enforcement.

The control strategies incorporate these components.

Key Elements

Addressing the cumulative impacts associated with exposure to air toxics requires a multi-faceted approach including short- and long-term strategies. AQMD staff’s suggested approach consists of three major components:

• a set of early-action control strategies for immediate development and implementation;
• Air Toxic Control Plan process; and
• Planned update to the Multiple Air Toxics Exposure Study, or MATES III.

Analysis for Identification of High Impact Areas

A significant amount of focus has been spent on potential criteria for determining high impact areas. Basin-wide regional cancer risk maps (using MATES II data) and year 2000 census data maps were developed by staff as part of their analysis. The results of MATES II were released in March 2000. MATES II examined the potential cancer risk from over 30 known toxic air contaminants including diesel particulates. MATES II data was an indicator of risk contributions and aided in identifying control strategies and further steps needed, such as improved data, tools, and modeling.

After examining MATES II modeling data and incorporating input from stakeholders, staff is recommending that modeled cancer risks be ranked according to mobile and stationary source contribution separately. The ranking provides a priority list to characterize source contribution and identify solutions to address cumulative impacts. MATES II cancer risk can be characterized in grid cells of 1 km x 1 km. Staff recommends that the approach for investigating potential high impact areas start with the top 100 grid cells with the highest mobile source impacts and another top 100 grid cells with the highest stationary source impacts. As a result, there will initially be a total of 200 grid cells analyzed, which may have some overlapping areas, but will be examined separately. Total mobile and stationary source contributions need to be examined separately because the nature of the sources and possible solutions are different. This approach should not be viewed as a cut-off point for defining high cumulative impact areas, rather it serves as guidance to prioritize staff resources. It is not staff’s intent to prohibit growth in the high impact areas identified. This prioritization should be re-examined in the future ATCP updates once staff gains more experience in addressing the cumulative impact issues and when additional technical information and tools become available.

Control Strategies

Early-Action Control Strategies

The early-action control strategies are those that staff recommends should be started immediately and proposed for Governing Board consideration in one to three years. The ten proposed strategies for addressing cumulative impacts would address both cancer and noncancer health effects and seek to reduce emissions and risk from back-up diesel generators, new sources near schools and possibly other sensitive receptors, yard hostlers, and chromium spray coating operations. In addition, other strategies include a pilot program for addressing odors, increased compliance assurance by focusing on repeat emission violations, and local government partnership.

Strategies identified may result in AQMD rules or policy guidelines. Any strategy that is developed into a rule will go through the full public review process, including CEQA and socioeconomic analysis and public comments, and will be developed for Governing Board consideration. Should any strategy be deemed infeasible after further staff analysis due to lack of legal authority or technical or economic feasibility, such findings will be presented to the Governing Board. New policies will also be presented to the Governing Board. Some of the strategies may already be initiated as part of AQMD’s EJ program.

Air Toxics Control Plan (ATCP) Process

Identifying and resolving cumulative impacts will be a continuous and iterative process since no single solution can adequately address the issues. Therefore, staff is proposing to integrate a cumulative impact component into the ATCP process, which will be updated periodically to incorporate the latest technical information as well as strategies to address air toxic issues (e.g., regional and localized) in the Basin. The ATCP was approved by the Governing Board in March 2000. It was designed to reduce air toxic exposure in the Basin and was envisioned to be updated following the SIP revision process.

Addendum to the Air Toxics Control Plan

An Addendum to the ATCP will be completed by the end of 2003. It will include improved emission data and a partial inventory update using the 2003 AQMP, as well as data from the implementation of control strategies contained within the March 2000 ATCP to revise current and projected air toxic levels. Although MATES III emissions monitoring will not be completed by this time, the inventory and assessment of changes in toxic air pollution levels can proceed for the air toxics plan addendum. Future updates to the ATCP will include MATES III data.

In addition to the ten early-action measures, staff recommends that the Addendum include 15 additional control strategies to be developed in the next three to five years. These include mobile source strategies, stationary source measures, and other strategies. Other strategies include diesel traffic flow control, pollution prevention, and targeted funding for projects in high cumulative impact areas. This comprehensive suite of measures should directly and indirectly contribute to decreasing cumulative air toxic exposures.

PUBLIC PROCESS

Stakeholder Input

The Working Group met seven times to discuss a program to reduce cumulative impacts from air pollution. These meetings, plus a series of five Community Forums and 9 other public meetings helped identify issues and potential approaches. The working group process, which included a facilitator, was very helpful to staff in the development of the recommended approaches.

Regarding the general approach, industry representatives suggested a program that would define areas of unusually high cumulative risks, identify the sources contributing to that risk, and develop programs targeting those sources contributing to the risk. Environmental and community members recommended: further implementation of pollution prevention; developing additional mitigation requirements for new and existing sources; targeting industry-wide emission reductions; adopting air toxic reduction goals; and developing source-specific rules containing health-based and distance-based criteria. Local government representatives stated that the program should: identify high risk areas from all contributors; analyze the risk contributors and identify the agency with proper authority to affect cumulative impact reductions; minimize disproportionate risk impacts first through existing programs; and create incentive programs to target under-regulated or unregulated problem sources.

Relative to areas of commonality, it was agreed that areas of high cumulative impacts need to be addressed. However, there was no definitive agreement on the approach to address high cumulative impacts. There was also consensus that in order to establish an effective program to reduce cumulative impacts, improvements in emission inventories, data, tools, and modeling are necessary. In addition, all parties agreed that non-cancer risks need to be identified and addressed. These areas of agreement correspond to the enhancements proposed for the periodic updates to the ATCP. There was general agreement on suggested control strategies to reduce air emissions from source-specific activities that are currently unregulated, such as truck and train idling, yard/port activities, chromium spray coating operations, and arsenic controls. There was also support for the Voluntary AQMD/Local Government/Public Agency Partnerships.

Key Issues

The two main issues raised involve concerns from local government and business about redlining and a local government concern about potential interference with land use decisions. Staff’s design principle includes these two concepts. Redlining was raised because addressing cumulative impacts at a localized level is perceived as creating potential barriers for future economic development. Staff’s recommended approach includes mostly strategies to be applied through out the Basin. Focusing resources on high cumulative impact areas based on the top 100 grid cells for each mobile and stationary source contributors (approximately the highest 1%) should also help alleviate this issue.

Local government representatives have also expressed concern that the CIRS could interfere with local land use (e.g., infill projects). Land use decisions are very important for cumulative impacts, as seen in circumstances where past decisions have resulted in incompatible land use. Staff’s recommendation is not to interfere with local land use authority, but to provide outreach, education, and technical assistance through improved partnership with local governments to facilitate appropriate land use decisions in the future and to help identify mitigation measures.

Business, local government, and environmental/community representatives also had different interests on control strategies related to more stringent requirements for new or existing sources. Industry and local government representatives are concerned about the potential increased burden on facilities, as well as equity of these requirements among sources contributing to the cumulative risk impacts. Environmental and community members would like the strategy to leave the option to lower the thresholds for all facilities regardless of location.

Staff’s recommendation is to consider more stringent requirements for facilities located near schools and possibly other sensitive receptors, since these situations seem to generate the most concern. Staff will also proceed with analysis of the top 100 grid cells for both mobile and stationary sources to identify sources contributing to cumulative impacts and evaluate effective solutions. Results of this analysis will be considered for possible future revisions of new source review, as well as requirements for existing sources.

Recommendations

Staff recommends commencement with the approach outlined that would call for immediate work to proceed to develop the Early-Action Control Strategies, an Addendum to the March 2000 Air Toxics Control Plan with a commitment for future periodic updates to the ATCP, and completion of MATES III.

Proposed Schedule

Staff proposes the following schedule:

1. Present White Paper to the Governing Board: September 2003.
2. Addendum to the March 2000 Air Toxics Control Plan: December 2003.
3. Report to the Stationary Source Committee every 6 months.
4. Report to Board once per year as part of the EJ Enhancements.
5. Continue Working Group meetings, as necessary, to receive input on proposals being developed.

Attachment (3,012 KB)

White Paper on Potential Control Strategies to Address Cumulative Impacts from Air Pollution

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