AG files motion to dismiss suit over haze

Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge filed a motion this week to dismiss the federal lawsuit that prompted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to issue a plan for Arkansas to address haze at national wilderness areas.

Meanwhile, the EPA, which is working with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality on a new plan, proposed a date of Aug. 31, 2016, for issuing a new plan.

Utilities — largely targeted by the current EPA plan for power plant emissions that cause haze — estimated that the plan would likely cost more than $1 billion to comply with, but the EPA has estimated the cost to be less than half of that figure.

The 1999 Regional Haze Rule, which is part of the Clean Air Act, is intended to reduce sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emission that contribute to visibility impairment at 156 national parks and certain wilderness areas.

Because of emissions produced by power plants in Arkansas, the state must address the Upper Buffalo and Caney Creek wilderness areas, in addition to the Hercules-Glades Wilderness Area and Mingo National Wildlife Refuge in Missouri.

By law, the rule targets only visibility, but proponents of the rule argue that reducing sulfur dioxide emissions will also reduce the number of respiratory illnesses and deaths in Arkansas and across the country.

The EPA plan for Arkansas to implement the rule was part of a proposed consent decree between the EPA and the Sierra Club, which had sued the EPA in 2014 for not issuing a plan two years after it had partially rejected a state plan for implementing the Regional Haze Rule. The state never resubmitted a plan, either.

In a filing Tuesday, Assistant Attorneys General Dara Andrew Hall and Jamie L. Ewing argued that the Sierra Club has no standing in the case and that it has shown no injury from the EPA’s decision not to issue a federal plan.

The Sierra Club has argued that it does have standing because of its membership in Arkansas and that injury can be measured by the visibility impairment caused by sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions.

The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality has supported the state’s recent intervention in the case and is working with the EPA to develop a state plan for implementing the Regional Haze Rule.

The EPA filed a motion this week opposing the Sierra Club’s request earlier this month for a judge to set a deadline by which a final plan must be issued.

The Sierra Club filed the request Sept. 8, concerned that the EPA would continue to push back the original Dec. 15, 2015, deadline. The environmental advocacy group asked for a deadline of April 15, 2016.

The EPA has said in filings that it would not have a plan by then because of limited resources. The agency’s Region 6 office, which serves Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico, is also working to implement the Regional Haze Rule in Texas.