EPA has agreed to make a decision by next month on whether one of the nation’s smoggiest regions has met a key air quality standard set almost three decades ago, a step that could lead to additional cleanup measures.
Under a proposed lawsuit settlement released Thursday, the agency would sign a final rule by Sept. 15 determining whether the San Joaquin Valley in central California complies with the 1997 ground-level ozone standard of 80 parts per billion. Another provision in the draft agreement sets a January deadline for EPA to make a decision on a “contingency measure” intended to further cut vehicle taipipe pollution in the region.
If approved by a federal judge, the tentative deal would resolve a lawsuit brought in April by the Committee for a Better Arvin and three other groups seeking to compel EPA to act.
Air pollution in the approximately 25,000-square mile region “is a public health crisis,” the groups wrote in the initial filing, brought in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Under the Clean Air Act, EPA was supposed to have made a decision by last December, the suit alleged.
