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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 101 / Thursday, May 27, 2021 / Rules and Regulations standard for an additional 10 years, and in South Coast Air Quality Management District v. EPA,1 the D.C. Circuit held that this requirement cannot be waived for areas, like the Youngstown Area, that had been redesignated to attainment for the 1997 ozone NAAQS
prior to revocation and that were designated attainment for the 2008
ozone NAAQS. CAA section 175A sets forth the criteria for adequate maintenance plans. In addition, EPA
has published longstanding guidance that provides further insight on the content of an approvable maintenance plan, explaining that a maintenance plan should address five elements: 1
An attainment emissions inventory; 2
a maintenance demonstration; 3 a commitment for continued air quality monitoring; 4 a process for verification of continued attainment; and 5 a contingency plan.2 PADEPs March 10, 2020 SIP submittal fulfills Pennsylvanias obligation to submit a second maintenance plan and addresses each of the five necessary elements.
As discussed in the October 30, 2020, NPRM, consistent with longstanding EPAs guidance,3 areas that meet certain criteria may be eligible to submit a limited maintenance plan LMP to satisfy one of the requirements of CAA
section 175A. Specifically, states may meet CAA section 175As requirements to provide for maintenance by demonstrating that an areas design values 4 are well below the NAAQS and that it has had historical stability attaining the NAAQS. EPA evaluated Pennsylvanias March 10, 2020
submittal for consistency with all applicable EPA guidance and CAA
requirements. EPA found that the submittal met CAA section 175A and all CAA requirements, and proposed approval of the LMP for the Youngstown Area as a revision to the Pennsylvania SIP. The effect of this action makes certain commitments 1 882

F.3d 1138 D.C. Cir. 2018.
for Processing Requests to Redesignate Areas to Attainment, Memorandum from John Calcagni, Director, Air Quality Management Division, September 4, 1992 Calcagni Memo.
3 See Limited Maintenance Plan Option for Nonclassifiable Ozone Nonattainment Areas from Sally L. Shaver, Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards OAQPS, dated November 16, 1994;
Limited Maintenance Plan Option for Nonclassifiable CO Nonattainment Areas from Joseph Paisie, OAQPS, dated October 6, 1995; and Limited Maintenance Plan Option for Moderate PM10 Nonattainment Areas from Lydia Wegman, OAQPS, dated August 9, 2001.
4 The ozone design value for a monitoring site is the 3-year average of the annual fourth-highest daily maximum 8-hour average ozone concentrations.
The design value for an ozone nonattainment area is the highest design value of any monitoring site in the area.

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related to the maintenance of the 1997
ozone NAAQS federally enforceable as part of the Pennsylvania SIP. Other specific requirements of PADEPs March 10, 2020 submittal and the rationale for EPAs proposed action are explained in the NPRM and will not be restated here.
III. EPAs Response to Comments Received EPA received two comments on the October 30, 2020 NPRM, which were not related to air quality issues, and one relevant comment on the March 1, 2021
reopened NPRM. All comments received are in the docket for this rulemaking action.
Comment The commenter asserts that the LMP
should not be approved because Pennsylvania identifies no actual contingency measures. According to the commenter, a contingency measure is supposed to be a known measure that can be quickly implemented by a state in order to prevent the violation of the NAAQS. The comment asserts that current contingency measures are defective because they allegedly will not be evaluated and determined until after an exceedance of the NAAQS has occurred, and that a contingency measure must be clearly identified and not an abstract promise of determining, at a later date, whether measures are needed and what measures would be proposed.
The comment claims that EPA is aware Pennsylvania has a history of not meeting its CAA requirements on time, and that it can take Pennsylvania more than two years to implement a regulation, which would be too long to prevent a violation of the NAAQS.
Further, the commenter asserts that the EPA should disapprove a states contingency plan that merely promises to later review conditions, determine whether measures are necessary and what they should be, and then implement them.
Response The commenter asserts that Pennsylvania identifies no actual contingency measures because the measures are not yet evaluated and determined and cannot be implemented before a violation of the NAAQS occurs. Because Pennsylvania identifies two regulatory and six nonregulatory contingency measures in general terms, EPA understands the comments use of the term evaluated and determined must mean something like the specific measures identified by PADEP have not been fully promulgated and are not in effect at this
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time. If EPAs understanding is correct, EPA agrees with this fact, but does not agree that this has any bearing on the approvability of the contingency measures or of the overall LMP.
PADEP identifies six non-regulatory measures and two regulatory measures.
The two regulatory measures are additional controls on consumer products and portable fuel containers.
The six non-regulatory measures are:
Voluntary diesel engine chip reflash;
diesel retrofit for public or private local onroad or offroad fleets; idling reduction technology for Class 2 yard locomotives; idling technologies or strategies for truck stops, warehouses, and other freight-handling facilities;
accelerated turnover of lawn and garden equipment; additional promotion of alternative fuel for home heating and agriculture use. As stated in the Calcagni memo, EPAs long-standing interpretation is that contingency measures for maintenance of the NAAQS are not required to be fully adopted in order to be approved. The commenter refers to a recent court case vacating, among other things, the contingency measure provisions in EPAs rule for implementing the 2015
ozone NAAQS, Sierra Club v. EPA, No.
151465 D.C. Cir. January 29, 2021. It is possible that the commenter has conflated the contingency measure provisions at issue in that case, which pertained to attainment plans, and those at issue in this LMP, which pertain to maintenance plans. The contingency measure provisions for maintenance and attainment are found in two different sections of the CAA, with substantially different wording and requirements.
The attainment plan contingency measures provisions in CAA Section 172c9 require that the attainment plan have specific measures that can take effect in any such case without further action by the State or the Administrator if the area fails to make reasonable further progress or attain the NAAQS. 42 U.S.C. 7502c9. Section 175A of the CAA sets forth the contingency measure requirements for maintenance areas. Section 175Ad requires that the maintenance plan contain such contingency provisions as the Administrator deems necessary to assure that the State will promptly correct any violation of the standard which occurs after the redesignation of the area as an attainment area. 42
U.S.C. 7505ad. Unlike Section 172c9 there is no requirement under section 175A that the contingency measures be set forth with specificity or that they be able to take effect without further action by EPA or the State.

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