Approval and Promulgation of Implementation Plans; States of Arizona and Nevada; Interstate Transport of Pollution

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

40 CFR Part 52

[EPA-R09-OAR-2007-AZ-0295; FRL-8443-6]

Approval and Promulgation of Implementation Plans; States of Arizona and Nevada; Interstate Transport of Pollution

AGENCY:

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

ACTION:

Proposed rule.

SUMMARY:

EPA is proposing to approve state implementation plans submitted by the States of Arizona and Nevada that address interstate transport with respect to the 8-hour ozone and fine particulate matter national ambient air quality standards. In so doing, EPA has determined that the plans submitted by Arizona and Nevada and approved herein satisfy requirements under Clean Air Act section 110(a)(2)(D)(i) for each State to submit a plan containing adequate provisions to prohibit interstate transport with respect to the standards for 8-hour ozone and fine particulate matter. EPA is proposing this action pursuant to those provisions of the Clean Air Act that obligate the Agency to take action on submittals of state implementation plans. The effect of this proposal would be to approve the Arizona and Nevada state implementation plans addressing interstate transport with respect to the 8-hour ozone and fine particulate standards and to eliminate obligations on the Agency to promulgate Federal Implementation Plans for these States addressing this same requirement.

DATES:

Any comments on this proposal must arrive by August 30, 2007.

ADDRESSES:

Submit your comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPA-R09-OAR-2007-AZ-0295 by one of the following methods:

•

Federal eRulemaking portal: http://www.regulations.gov.

Follow the on-line instructions for submitting comments.

•

E-mail: tax.wienke@epa.gov.

•

Fax:

(415) 947-3579 (please alert the individual listed in the

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT

if you are faxing comments).

•

Mail:

Wienke Tax, Office of Air Planning, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Region IX, Mailcode AIR-2, 75 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, California 94105-3901.

•

Hand Delivery:

Wienke Tax, Office of Air Planning, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Region IX, Mailcode AIR-2, 75 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, California 94105-3901. Such deliveries are only accepted Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4:55 p.m., excluding federal holidays. Special arrangements should be made for deliveries of boxed information.

Instructions:

Direct your comments to Docket ID No. EPA-R09-OAR-2007-AZ-0295. EPA's policy is that all comments received will be included in the public docket without change and may be made available online at

http://www.regulations.gov,

including any personal information provided, unless the comment includes information claimed to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Do not submit information that you consider to be CBI or otherwise protected through

http://www.regulations.gov

or e-mail. The

http://www.regulations.gov

Web site is an “anonymous access” system, which means EPA will not know your identity or contact information unless you provide it in the body of your comment. If you send an e-mail comment directly to EPA, without going through

http://www.regulations.gov,

your e-mail address will be automatically captured and included as part of the comment that is placed in the public docket and made available on the Internet. If you submit an electronic comment, EPA recommends that you include your name and other contact information in the body of your comment and with any disk or CD-ROM you submit. If EPA cannot read your comment due to technical difficulties and cannot contact you for clarification, EPA may not be able to consider your comment. Electronic files should avoid the use of special characters, any form of encryption, and be free of any defects or viruses. For additional information about EPA's public docket visit the EPA Docket Center homepage at

http://www.epa.gov/epahome/dockets.htm.

Docket:

All documents in the docket are listed in the

http://www.regulations.gov

index. Although listed in the index, some information is not publicly available,

e.g.

, CBI or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Certain other material, such as copyrighted material, will be publicly available only in hard copy form. Publicly available docket materials are available either electronically in

http://www.regulations.gov

or in hard copy at the Office of Air Planning, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Region IX, Mailcode AIR-2, 75 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, California 94105-3901. EPA requests that if at all possible, you contact the individual listed in the

FOR FURTHER

INFORMATION CONTACT

section to view the hard copy of the docket. You may view the hard copy of the docket Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., excluding federal holidays.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

For Arizona issues, contact Wienke Tax, Office of Air Planning, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region IX, (520) 622-1622, e-mail:

tax.wienke@epa.gov.

For Nevada issues, contact Karina O'Connor, Office of Air Planning, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region IX, (775) 833-1276,

oconnor.karina@epa.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Throughout this document, wherever “we,” “us,” or “our” is used, we mean the EPA.

EPA is proposing to approve state implementation plans submitted by the States of Arizona and Nevada that address interstate transport with respect to the 8-hour ozone and fine particulate matter national ambient air quality standards. In so doing, EPA has determined that the plans submitted by Arizona and Nevada and approved herein satisfy requirements under Clean Air Act section 110(a)(2)(D)(i) for each State to submit a plan containing adequate provisions to prohibit interstate transport with respect to the standards for 8-hour ozone and fine particulate matter. The effect of this proposal would be to approve the Arizona and Nevada state implementation plans addressing interstate transport with respect to the 8-hour ozone and fine particulate standards and to eliminate obligations on the Agency to promulgate Federal Implementation Plans for these States addressing this same requirement.

In the Rules and Regulations section of this

Federal Register

, we are taking direct final action to take these actions because we believe that they are not controversial. If we receive adverse comments, however, we will publish a timely withdrawal of the direct final rule and address the comments in subsequent action based on this proposed rule. We do not plan to open a second comment period, so anyone interested in commenting should do so at this time. If we do not receive comments, no further activity is planned. For further information on this proposal and the rationale underlying our proposed action, please see the direct final rule.

Dated: June 11, 2007.

Laura Yoshii,

Acting Regional Administrator, Region IX.

[FR Doc. E7-14475 Filed 7-30-07; 8:45 am]

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