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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 154 / Friday, August 13, 2021 / Proposed Rules 1. The Commission establishes Docket No. RM20218 for consideration of the matters raised by the Petition of the United States Postal Service for the Initiation of a Proceeding to Consider Proposed Changes in Analytical Principles Proposal Five, filed August 4, 2021.
2. Comments by interested persons in this proceeding are due no later than September 15, 2021.
3. Pursuant to 39 U.S.C. 505, the Commission appoints Jennaca D.
Upperman to serve as an officer of the Commission Public Representative to represent the interests of the general public in this docket.
4. The Secretary shall arrange for publication of this order in the Federal Register.
By the Commission.
Erica A. Barker, Secretary.
FR Doc. 202117191 Filed 81221; 8:45 am BILLING CODE 7710FWP

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
AGENCY
40 CFR Part 81
EPAR09OAR20210426; FRL871003
R9

Designation of Areas for Air Quality Planning Purposes; California; Eastern Kern, Sacramento Metro, and Western Nevada 2015 Ozone Nonattainment Areas; Reclassification to Serious Environmental Protection Agency EPA.
ACTION: Proposed rule.

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AGENCY:

SUMMARY: Under the Clean Air Act CAA, the Environmental Protection Agency EPA is proposing to grant requests by the California Air Resources Board CARB to reclassify three nonattainment areas in California from Moderate to Serious for the 2015
ozone national ambient air quality standards NAAQS. These three areas are herein referred to as the Eastern Kern, Sacramento Metro, and Western Nevada nonattainment areas. In connection with the reclassification, the EPA is proposing to establish deadlines for submittal of revisions to the Eastern Kern, Sacramento Metro, and Western Nevada portions of the California state implementation plan SIP to meet additional requirements for Serious ozone nonattainment areas.
DATES: Comments must be received on or before September 13, 2021.
ADDRESSES: Submit your comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPAR09

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OAR20210426 at https
www.regulations.gov. For comments submitted at Regulations.gov, follow the online instructions for submitting comments. Once submitted, comments cannot be edited or removed from Regulations.gov. The EPA may publish any comment received to its public docket. Do not submit electronically any information you consider to be Confidential Business Information CBI
or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Multimedia submissions audio, video, etc. must be accompanied by a written comment.
The written comment is considered the official comment and should include discussion of all points you wish to make. The EPA will generally not consider comments or comment contents located outside of the primary submission i.e., on the web, cloud, or other file sharing system. For additional submission methods, please contact the person identified in the FOR
FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section.
For the full EPA public comment policy, information about CBI or multimedia submissions, and general guidance on making effective comments, please visit https www.epa.gov/dockets/
commenting-epa-dockets. If you need assistance in a language other than English or if you are a person with disabilities who needs a reasonable accommodation at no cost to you, please contact the person identified in the FOR
FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ben Leers, Air Planning Office AIR2, EPA
Region IX, 415 9474279, Leers.Ben@
epa.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Throughout this document, we, us, and our refer to the EPA.
Table of Contents I. Background II. Serious Area Requirements and Proposed Schedule A. Serious Area Plan Requirements in General B. New Source Review and Title V Program Revisions C. Reasonably Available Control Technology D. Transportation Control III. Reclassification of Areas of Indian Country IV. Proposed Action and Request for Public Comment V. Statutory and Executive Order Reviews
I. Background The CAA requires the EPA to establish primary and secondary NAAQS for certain pervasive pollutants that may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health and welfare.
The primary NAAQS is designed to
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protect public health with an adequate margin of safety, and the secondary NAAQS is designed to protect public welfare and the environment. The EPA
has set NAAQS for six common air pollutants, referred to as criteria pollutants, including ozone. The NAAQS represent the air quality levels an area must meet to comply with the CAA. Ozone is a gas composed of three oxygen atoms and is created by chemical reactions between volatile organic compounds VOC and oxides of nitrogen NOX in the atmosphere in the presence of sunlight. Ground-level ozone can harm human health and the environment. Ozone exposure has been associated with increases in susceptibility to respiratory infections, medication use by asthmatics, doctor visits, and emergency department visits and hospital admissions for individuals with respiratory disease. Ozone exposure may also contribute to premature death, especially in people with heart and lung disease.
In October 2015, the EPA
strengthened the primary and secondary eight-hour ozone NAAQS from 0.075
parts per million ppm to 0.070 ppm 2015 ozone NAAQS.1 In accordance with section 107d of the CAA, the EPA
must designate an area nonattainment if it is violating the NAAQS or if it is contributing to a violation of the NAAQS in a nearby area. With respect to the ozone NAAQS, the EPA further classifies nonattainment areas as Marginal, Moderate, Serious, Severe, or Extreme, depending upon the ozone design value for an area.2 As a general matter, higher classified ozone nonattainment areas are subject to a greater number of, and more stringent, CAA planning requirements than lower classified areas but are allowed more time to demonstrate attainment of the ozone NAAQS.3
Effective August 3, 2018, the EPA
designated and classified the Eastern
1 80

FR 65291 October 26, 2015.
CAA section 181a1. For the 2015 ozone NAAQS, the design value at each monitoring site is the annual fourth-highest daily maximum 8-hour average ozone concentration, averaged over three years. The design value for an area is the highest design value among the monitoring sites in the area.
3 See, generally, subpart 2 of part D of title I of the CAA.
2 See
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