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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 183 / Friday, September 24, 2021 / Proposed Rules for the San Joaquin Valley as meeting the subpart 4 RACM Moderate area planning requirements under CAA
section 189 for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5
NAAQS, the EPA is evaluating relevant portions of the SJV PM2.5 Plan for compliance with this requirement. In addition, as discussed above, the EPA
has not previously approved a SIP
submission for the San Joaquin Valley as meeting the Serious area planning requirements under CAA section 189b1 for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5
NAAQS. Some Serious area planning requirements operate on a timeline that is based on the outermost statutory Serious area attainment date of the end of the tenth calendar year following the areas designation to nonattainment.
Because section 189d requires a state to address any applicable Serious area requirements that the state has not already met in the area, and the section 189d obligations do not come into effect until an area has failed to attain the NAAQS by the Serious area attainment date, the EPA proposes that it should evaluate any previously unmet Serious area planning obligations based on the current, applicable attainment date appropriate under section 189d, and not the original Serious area attainment date.
The EPA provided its preliminary views on the CAAs requirements for particulate matter plans under part D, title I of the Act in the following guidance documents: 1 State Implementation Plans; General Preamble for the Implementation of Title I of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 General Preamble; 56 2
State Implementation Plans; General Preamble for the Implementation of Title I of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990; Supplemental General Preamble Supplement; 57 and 3
State Implementation Plans for Serious PM10 Nonattainment Areas, and Attainment Date Waivers for PM10
Nonattainment Areas Generally;
Addendum to the General Preamble for the Implementation of Title I of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990
General Preamble Addendum.58
More recently, in an August 24, 2016
final rule entitled, Fine Particulate Matter National Ambient Air Quality Standards: State Implementation Plan Requirements PM2.5 SIP
Requirements Rule, the EPA
established regulatory requirements and provided further interpretive guidance on the statutory SIP requirements that apply to areas designated nonattainment 56 57

FR 13498 April 16, 1992.
FR 18070 April 28, 1992.
58 59 FR 41998 August 16, 1994.
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for the PM2.5 NAAQS.59 We discuss these regulatory requirements and interpretations of the Act as appropriate in our evaluation of the SJV PM2.5 Plan that follows.
IV. Review of the San Joaquin Valley PM2.5 Plan for the 1997 24-Hour PM2.5
NAAQS
The EPA is evaluating the SJV PM2.5
Plan against the Serious area requirements for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5
NAAQS and the section 189d requirements for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5
NAAQS, as laid out in section III of this proposal. Many requirements for both a Serious area plan and a section 189d plan are structured around the relevant statutory attainment date. The latest statutory Serious area attainment date for the San Joaquin Valley area was December 31, 2015.60 On November 23, 2016, the EPA determined that the area failed to attain by the Serious area attainment date.
For the purposes of the section 189d requirements, the attainment date is the date by which a state can attain the NAAQS as expeditiously as practicable, but no later than five years from the publication date of the final determination of failure to attain.61 As discussed in section IV.D, the SJV PM2.5
Plan projected that attainment could be achieved in fewer than five years, i.e., by December 31, 2020.
When the State submitted the SJV
PM2.5 Plan in 2019, the State withdrew its previous Serious area plan that it had developed to meet the December 31, 2015 Serious area attainment date.
Because the State submitted the SJV
PM2.5 Plan after the EPAs finding that the area had failed to attain by the applicable Serious area attainment date, the State could not demonstrate in the SJV PM2.5 Plan that the area would attain by the Serious area attainment date, nor could it address other requirements based on this attainment date, such as RFP and quantitative milestones, because many of the relevant dates had already passed. As described in section III of this 59 81

FR 58010.
discussed in section I.B, California submitted its Serious area plan for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5 NAAQS in two submissions dated June 25, 2015 and August 13, 2015, including a request under section 188e to extend the attainment date for the 1997 24-hour PM2.5 NAAQS by three years to December 31, 2018. On October 6, 2016, the EPA denied the request for an extension, but did not finalize action on the Serious area plan submissions. Accordingly, the Serious area attainment date remained unchanged: As expeditiously as practicable but no later than December 31, 2015.
61 CAA section 179d3; 81 FR 84481, 84482.
The determination of failure to attain published on November 23, 2016.
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document, in a section 189d plan, a state must address any statutory requirements applicable to Moderate and Serious nonattainment area plans to the extent that it has not already met those requirements, but the EPA
believes that it should base this evaluation on the current applicable attainment date under section 189d.
For example, it would be illogical to require a state to submit a Serious area modeled attainment demonstration that provided for attainment by December 31, 2015, after the EPA has already determined based on monitoring data that the state failed to attain by such date.
For the purposes of our evaluation of the Serious area plan requirements, although the State is required to submit a Serious area plan, and it must structure such a plan based on the Serious area attainment date, it would serve no purpose to evaluate the SJV
PM2.5 Plan against the now-passed Serious area attainment date by which the area has already failed to attain. For example, RFP and quantitative milestones normally are dependent upon the attainment date. Accordingly, because the State must still meet all Serious area plan requirements, even if doing so later in conjunction with the section 189d plan and its later attainment date, we will evaluate the States compliance with the Serious area plan requirements in light of the later section 189d attainment date, as appropriate. Where the State in the SJV
PM2.5 Plan applies the section 189d attainment date to a Serious area requirement, we will note the statutory Serious area timeline and accept the submission in fulfillment of the States Serious area plan obligation, but evaluate the submission in light of the section 189d attainment date.
A. Emissions Inventories 1. Statutory and Regulatory Requirements CAA section 172c3 requires that each SIP include a comprehensive, accurate, current inventory of actual emissions from all sources of the relevant pollutant or pollutants in the nonattainment area. The EPA discussed the emissions inventory requirements that apply to PM2.5 nonattainment areas in the PM2.5 SIP Requirements Rule and codified these requirements in 40 CFR
51.1008.62 The EPA has also issued guidance concerning emissions 62 Id.

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