309 Committee: Documents

2008 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (03/31/10) PDF or DOC
This report compares the 2006-2008 sulfur dioxide emissions with the 2008 milestone for the four §309 states participating in the Western Emissions Backstop Trading Program. This is a transitional report comparing emissions against the revised 2008 milestone as presented in current State Implementation Plans (SIP’s). Utah & Wyoming have submitted revised SIP’s for review by EPA, while Arizona and New Mexico are in the process of completing their revisions. Only stationary sources emitting greater than 100 tons per year are included in the program. Results indicate that the 2006-2008 average emissions were about 30% below the revised 2008 milestone for the four §309 states.

2007 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (03/31/09) PDF or DOC
This report compares the 2005-2007 sulfur dioxide emissions with the 2007 milestone for the four §309 states participating in the Western Emissions Backstop Trading Program. This is a transitional report comparing emissions against the 2007 milestone as calculated under the original 2003 State Implementation Plans (SIP’s), as well as against the revised 2007 milestone as calculated under the current plans (Utah & Wyoming have submitted revised SIP’s, while Arizona and New Mexico are in the process of completing their revisions). Only stationary sources emitting greater than 100 tons per year are included in the program. Results indicate that the 2005-2007 average emissions were about 33% below the revised 2007 milestone for the four §309 states.

§309 Program Materials (April ‘08 Final Revisions)
Four western states (AZ, NM, UT & WY) are planning on re-submitting State Implementation Plans under Section §309 of the federal regional haze rule. These states (along with OR) originally submitted SIP’s in 2003, but due to legal challenges, these initial submittals were never approved by the EPA. The four remaining §309 states began working on redesigning the SO2 Milestones required for the §309 Regional Haze option in early 2007, and have now developed a proposal for revised Milestones, along with a variety of supporting materials for implementing the Backstop SO2 Trading Program. The milestones and the supporting materials have been revised in response to Stakeholder comments received during multiple Stakeholder calls over the Winter of 2007-2008. Available below for download and stakeholder review are the Final key materials supporting the new §309 SO2 Milestones and Backstop Trading Program.

• Projection of Visibility tables and explanation (12/11/07) PDF or DOC
• Better than BART document - typographical correction (07/23/09) PDF or DOC
• SIP Table Yearly Milestones (04/23/08) XLS
• Milestone Spreadsheet Version 27 - typographical correction (04/29/09) XLS
• Model SIP-TIP (04/23/08) PDF or DOC
• Example Trading Rule (Note: each §309 State will have its own Version of this Rule) PDF

2006 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (03/20/08) PDF or DOC
This report compares the 2004-2006 sulfur dioxide emissions with the 2006 milestone for the four-state region participating in the Western Emissions Backstop Trading Program. Only stationary sources emitting greater than 100 tons per year are included in the program. The 2004-2006 average emissions were about 30% below the milestone for the four remaining §309 states.

FINAL REPORT: WRAP SO2 MILESTONE TRACKING PROCESS AUDIT (10/02/07) PDF
Five western states (AZ, NM, OR, UT & WY) submitted State Implementation Plans under Section §309 of the federal regional haze rule [40 CFR 51.309] to establish a sulfur dioxide (SO2) milestones and a backstop trading program. This program requires major industrial sources of SO2 emissions to submit an annual emissions inventory to their respective state air quality offices. These inventories, in turn, are compiled by the Western Regional Air Partnership (WRAP) and analyzed to determine compliance with the regional SO2 milestones.

The backstop trading program also calls for an independent audit to ensure that the state inventories and regional analyses are accurate and efficient. The program guideline states that the first audit shall occur during the 2006 calendar year, and shall review data collected during the first two years of the program. The primary focus of the audit is on the process that is used to compute the regional inventory from the data provided by each state, and the tracking of accumulated changes during the period between SIP revisions. The audit shall also review the accuracy and integrity of the regional reports that are used by the §309 states to determine compliance with the milestones.

This document represents the FINAL Report, describing the results of the milestone tracking program audit that was conducted by E.H. Pechan & Associates during the Fall of 2006. The participating §309 States completed Public Notice of this report during the Spring/Summer of 2007 to provide an opportunity for public review and comment on the draft audit report. The audit report then goes to the EPA under each states’ Administrative process.

2005 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (04/02/07) PDF or DOC
This report compares the 2003-2005 sulfur dioxide emissions with the 2005 milestone for the five-state region participating in the Western Emissions Backstop Trading Program. Only stationary sources emitting greater than 100 tons per year are included in the program. The 2003-2005 average emissions were about 27% below the milestone for the five states.

2004 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (03/31/06) PDF or DOC
This report compares the 2003-2004 sulfur dioxide emissions with the 2004 milestone for the five-state region participating in the Western Emissions Backstop Trading Program. Only stationary sources emitting greater than 100 tons per year are included in the program. The 2003-2004 average emissions were about 25% below the milestone for the five states.

2003 Regional SO2 Emissions and Milestone Report (04/21/05) PDF or DOC
This report compiles the 2003 emissions from sources subject to the western backstop SO2 trading program and compares them to the 5-state regional milestone. Emissions were found to be 25 percent below the milestone.