EPA gets county’s air quality report

Adrienne Packer

Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2000 | 10:56 a.m.

Clark County's clean air plan, which is essential to future highway funds, reached a critical point Tuesday when it was forwarded to the Environmental Protection Agency's regional office in San Francisco.

The county expects the EPA to make a key ruling on the Carbon Monoxide State Implementation Plan within three months.

If the EPA approves the emissions reduction portion of the report, the Regional Transportation Commission can proceed with its transportation improvement plans -- three-year and 20-year plans designed to accommodate growth.

However, if the federal agency rejects the report, Clark County could lose federal highway funds and the authority to write its own air quality plan.

The clean-air report is the same plan that caused a stir in 1999 when the county missed its deadline. The report was submitted more than a month late and then it was rejected.

The EPA gave Clark County until Dec. 31 to get its plan approved and threatened to put sanctions in place if it did not. Unlike last year, Clark County air quality planners are confident the latest report will be accepted.

"We've documented our control measures, and we've met with the EPA on a regular basis to assuage their concerns," said Russell Roberts, a Clark County air quality planner. "It's taken a tremendous amount of time."

The county has numbers backing its plan. It shows the primary methods being used to reduce carbon monoxide levels are effective.

Clark County last exceeded carbon monoxide standards a year and a half ago. That even includes Sunrise Acres on East Charleston Boulevard, the valley's most polluted area because its low elevation and heavy traffic.

While the federal standard is 9 parts per million (ppm), the county found carbon monoxide levels of 11.4 ppm at the East Charleston site. The worse level the county has ever registered was 14 ppm.

The most effective elements of the clean-air plan are the beefed up smog programs and the county's clean burning fuel requirement.

In the winter months -- between November and March -- the county requires gas stations to use fuel with lower sulfur and aromatic levels. The gas, which costs about 3 cents to 5 cents more a gallon, makes catalytic converters more effective, reducing carbon monoxide output.

Roberts said winter is the worst time for pollution because of a lack of wind.

The plan's success was quite a feat considering the constant growth and increasing number of vehicles in the Las Vegas Valley, Roberts said.

"It does what is needed for attainment, and we did it without a moratorium on growth or putting major controls in place," Roberts said.

But the challenge is not over. Not only does the plan have to work now but it must continue to be effective over the next two decades.

The air quality plan was required by the federal government after the county slipped from moderate nonattainment to serious nonattainment in 1997. It's directly tied to the Regional Transportation Commission's transportation plan.

Until 1999 the transportation commission could implement its programs as long as the clean-air plans had been submitted to the EPA. An amendment to the law requires the air quality plan to be approved before the transportation board can move forward with its projects.

"That's why the urgency and timeliness of this plan is so acute," Roberts said.

Because the transportation commission's plan extends 20 years, and it must conform with the air quality plan, the two must span the same length of time.

Air quality planners not only have to forecast the number of "vehicle miles traveled" throughout the valley now, but it must speculate what that figure will be in 20 years.

The plan shows that in 2000, the county expects 25 million vehicle miles traveled; the figure jumps to 57 million in two decades.

If the plan is approved by the EPA, Roberts said the next step is learning how to keep in compliance over a 20-year period. The county can start by considering air quality when it develops master plans or approves major developments. Air quality should be as high a priority as fire stations, police stations and schools, he said.

"When you do land use plans, you have to consider transportation and air quality," he said. "That's how you make air quality plans work over 20 years."