WESTAR Planning Committee Call
WESTAR Planning Committee Call
Meeting Summary
July 7, 2005
Participants: Alice Edwards (AK), Jean Paul Huys (NV), Dave McNeill (UT), Doug Schneider (WA), Cheryl Heying (UT), Bob Lebens (WESTAR), Tina Anderson (WY), Brad Schultz (SD), Corky Martincovic (AZ) , Rita Trujillo (NM), Don Arkell (WESTAR), Tina Suarez-Murias (CA),
- CALL TO ORDER:
(a)Establish Who Is Taking Notes: Dave McNeill
(b)Review June 2, 2005 Meeting Minutes (June2005_minutes.doc)
The June 2nd minutes were approved.
2.ACTION ISSUE ITEMS:
(a)Update on Regional Ozone Issues and Rulemakings
Alice reported that Steve Arnold had updated her on the progress of the WESTAR workgroup on Ozone transport. There was a proposal at the Directors’ Meeting to move ahead with getting a contractor to look at ozone issues in the west. The RFP will be let out in July, and will include a timeframe that will have the analysis completed by the Spring Business Meeting. Specifically, they are to see if transport had a significant impact on ozone levels in the west. Bob Lebens reported that he has spoken with 5-6 contractors about the RFP. There is $20,000 to do the analysis of monitoring data. He will send the RFP to Alice who can forward it to the committee members.
(b)Section 110(a)(2)SIP notice about ozone/PM2.5 transport
Bob Lebens wanted the committee members to know that the EPA had published the 110(a)(2)(D) SIP notice in the Federal Register on April 25, 2005, which started a 2-year clock for us to get our SIPs in to EPA (by May 25th 2007). If a state is a CAIR state, then CAIR takes care of this for that state. EPA will provide guidance for those of us who are not CAIR states (editorial comment: Yea, right – by May, 2009). Jean-Paul said he spoke with his region on this, and they have told him their SIP will probably be a letter telling EPA they don’t have any impact on other states. Doug said he has had the same response from the EPA staff identified in the 110(a)(2) notice in the Federal Register. However, it was suggested that we may have to do more than a letter – it was suggested that EPA staff may not know where the West is (that’s in my notes, so…). Rita asked if the RH modeling might help with the transport discussion in the west, and Corky said they spoke with Tom Moore, and while the modeling may help, it sounds like these SIPs may be cake walks, and that work will be unnecessary. There was a discussion about coordination of timelines for the various SIPs that we are all working on right now. Tina (California) said we need to have a definition for “significant impact” before we can proceed. We decided we would wait for the guidance from EPA, but we shouldn’t expect it on time. The states were asked to contact their regions to get a read on where they think this is going, and report back to the committee next month.
(c)Particulate Matter Standards
Alice discussed the fact sheet that was just published on the PM staff paper. She said that the final staff paper is out on the web. There was a discussion about what the committee can do by the September Business Meeting, particularly noting that the proposal is for a coarse Urban standard. Doug noted that this proposal is tighter than what was originally proposed – he mentioned a table at the back of the staff paper looking at the impact of the proposal by geographic regions, and there was a discussion about how many counties would not be meeting the new standards. There was also a discussion about the “50% of PM10 = PMcoarse” assumption EPA used to do the tables, which Brad pointed out means they probably underestimated the numbers of counties that will be wind-blown dust areas. Doug pointed out that the directors have a call with Lydia next week on this issue. Jean-Paul recommended the committee keep a close eye on developments with the standard review. Alice pointed out that the definition of “urban” will have a significant impact on us all. Tina said we need to be consistent with how we estimate the impact of the proposal. She said the CASAC wants to focus on truly urban areas like LA and NYC, but that we need to communicate with CASAC that it’s not obvious how the urban/rural split is occurring. There followed a discussion about the timeframe for PM2.5 SIPs now due and when the revision of the standard is set to be done. Cheryl Heying said that finalizing the new NAAQS will be years down the road, but it is critical out here in the west to understand this point because urban and rural areas out west are so close to each other. Bob Lebens said that the Council will settle on the agenda for the Fall Business Meeting, and one topic will be the new PM Standards. Alice requested that Bob distribute the announcement of the next Council call so members of the committee can listen in. The committee members need to let the directors know how many nonattainment areas we will have with the new NAAQS, so Alice suggested we bring the information back on our next call, get it to Bob Lebens, and give it to the council and see where they want to go with it. Tina suggested generating a map of rural and urban areas to help people see the differences. She said CASAC will be discussing the 2nd staff paper soon, and it might be good if we kept on top of that.
3.TRACKING ISSUE ITEMS:
(a)Regional Haze Planning Update
Don Arkell said EPA recently released the BART rule and discussed how that will take care of some of the court cases. He also reported that the Phase II of the Attribution of Haze work is underway – they are developing a report and technical system that can be used for planning and will also function as the technical support for upcoming SIPs. There will be a kick off meeting for that workgroup later this month. He also reported that the Fire Forum met in June and their work is underway to complete the planning emissions inventory for fire (base and 2018 inventories). They are also working on finalizing the reduction techniques and tracking system. Their meeting notes are available on the WRAP website.
(b)Update from NEP Workgroup
Doug Schneider reported that the NEP work is moving beyond the workgroup – STAPPA is asking for volunteers, and members of our workgroup will be involved with that. Through STAPPA, we will work with EPA on the Natural/Exceptional Event rule they are developing. They say they need to have it completed by December so it can go out with the PMcoarse rule. Most of the original volunteers were from the Western states – Amy Royden (STAPPA) is trying to get a broader representation on the workgroup. EPA has said they will meet with STAPPA in a week or two on this. EPA is currently working through issues internally and will let us know when they are ready to talk. We had originally thought our recommendations would become STAPPA recommendations, but there is no time for that, given EPA’s rush to get this done, so when the STAPPA workgroup meets with EPA, we will tell them that WESTAR’s issues are the state’s issues. He said that it appears EPA will resist making any changes to the current PM10 policy because the PM10 NAAQS will be rescinded soon. The workgroup is looking for documentation states have submitted after the 6 month period that has been rejected by EPA. Region IX confirmed to AZ that the 180 day is a max and will not be exceeded. Alice said it sounds like the workgroup will have plenty of western representation. Doug concluded saying that it sounds like EPA may limit it to PM to start with, but they are moving so fast on this, they may not involve us in the process.
- DISCUSSION ITEMS/OPEN MICROPHONE:Anyone
Open microphone – nothing brought up
(a)Topics for Upcoming MeetingsAlice Edwards
Dave M asked for an update on 4-corners meetings currently underway.
We all agreed that we need to keep the PM NAAQS on the top of our discussion items.
Cheryl Heying said that Utah is in the middle of a redesignation request for PM10, and is proposing changing the PSD baseline date to the date the area is redesignated, but we are getting kickback from EPA. She would like to discuss PSD and redesignation further. Rita suggested the PSD working group should discuss this – they are not having regular meetings. Bob Lebens reported it is not coming up on other committees. Cheryl will send the question out to members of the PSD workgroup, and get back to us on that.
We discussed the meetings coming up in Portland – the IWG and WESTAR BART meetings are in the same hotel the same week – many may want to attend both.
Next call confirmed for August 4th at the regular time