September 23, 2009 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (``CERCLA'' or ``the Act''), as amended, requires that the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan (``NCP'') include a list of national priorities among the known releases or threatened releases of hazardous substances, pollutants, or contaminants throughout the United States. The National Priorities List (``NPL'') constitutes this list. The NPL is intended primarily to guide the Environmental Protection Agency (``EPA'' or ``the Agency'') in determining which sites warrant further investigation. These further investigations will allow EPA to assess the nature and extent of public health and environmental risks associated with the site and to determine what CERCLA-financed remedial action(s), if any, may be appropriate. This rule proposes to add nine sites to the General Superfund Section of the NPL.

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (``CERCLA'' or ``the Act''), as amended, requires that the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan (``NCP'') include a list of national priorities among the known releases or threatened releases of hazardous substances, pollutants, or contaminants throughout the United States. The National Priorities List (``NPL'') constitutes this list. The NPL is intended primarily to guide the Environmental Protection Agency (``EPA'' or ``the Agency'') in determining which sites warrant further investigation. These further investigations will allow EPA to assess the nature and extent of public health and environmental risks associated with the site and to determine what CERCLA-financed remedial action(s), if any, may be appropriate. This rule adds 11 sites to the NPL, all to the General Superfund Section.

The EPA is proposing to determine that various ozone nonattainment areas in New York and New Jersey have attained the one- hour and eight-hour National Ambient Air Quality Standards for ozone. For the one-hour standard, the areas are: the Atlantic City and Warren County areas in New Jersey and the Albany-Schenectady-Troy, Buffalo- Niagara Falls, Essex County, Jefferson County, and Poughkeepsie areas in New York. For the eight-hour standard, the areas are: Buffalo- Niagara Falls, Jamestown, Poughkeepsie and Essex County (Whiteface Mountain). The States requested these determinations, based upon three years of complete, quality-assured ambient air monitoring data and these areas have continued to attain these ozone standards based on examination of the most recent air quality data from 2006-2008. These data demonstrate that the one-hour and eight-hour ozone standards have been attained in these areas. If EPA makes these proposed determinations final for the one-hour standard, the areas subject to the one-hour standard will have completed their progress toward achieving the one-hour health standard. In the cases where EPA determines that areas have attained the eight-hour standard, the requirements for the state to submit certain reasonable further progress plans, attainment demonstrations, contingency measures and any other planning requirements of the Clean Air Act related to attainment of the ozone standards shall be suspended for as long as the areas continue to attain the eight-hour ozone standard. These proposed determinations of attainment are not redesignations of these areas to attainment. Redesignations must meet additional requirements, including an approved plan to maintain compliance with the air quality standard for ten years after redesignation.

The Department of Energy (DOE) today gives notice of a Request for Information on the PV Manufacturing Initiative. The ``PV Manufacturing Initiative'' is intended to coordinate stakeholders and technology development efforts across the solar community to facilitate the development of a strong PV manufacturing industry in the United States. The primary goals of this initiative include supporting the creation of a robust United States-based PV manufacturing technology including infrastructure and supply chain base, developing a highly trained workforce with the critical skills required to meet the needs of a rapidly growing industry, and speeding the implementation of new cutting edge technologies.

In an August 19, 2009, Federal Register notice, EPA announced that it was seeking comments on additional approaches to analyzing data related to the Agency's preliminary regulatory determination for perchlorate. The additional comments are sought in an effort to ensure consideration of all the potential options for evaluating whether there is a meaningful opportunity for human health risk reduction of perchlorate through a national primary drinking water rule. In response to requests from several stakeholders, this action reopens the public comment period for an additional 15 days.

The Administrator, Southwestern Power Administration (Southwestern), has prepared Current and Revised 2009 Power Repayment Studies which show the need for an increase in annual revenues to meet cost recovery criteria. Such increased revenues are needed primarily to cover increased investments and replacements in hydroelectric generating facilities and increased operation and maintenance expenses. The Administrator has developed proposed Integrated System rates, which are supported by a rate design study, to recover the required revenues. The June 2009 Revised Study indicates that the proposed rates would increase annual system revenues approximately 10.8 percent from $160,255,300 to $177,586,158.

This notice announces EPA's order for the cancellations, voluntarily requested by the registrants and accepted by the Agency, of pesticide products containing disulfoton or methamidophos, pursuant to section 6(f)(1) of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), as amended. This cancellation order follows a July 22, 2009 Federal Register Notice of Receipt Requests (FRL-8427-2) from the disulfoton and methamidophos registrants to voluntarily cancel their product registrations. These are the last disulfoton and methamidophos products registered for use in the United States. In the July 22, 2009 Notice, EPA indicated that it would issue an order implementing the cancellations, unless the Agency received substantive comments within the 30 day comment period that would merit its further review of these requests, or unless the registrants withdrew their requests within this period. The Agency did not receive any comments on the notice. Further, the registrants did not withdraw their requests. Accordingly, EPA hereby issues in this Notice a cancellation order granting the requested cancellations. Any distribution, sale or use of disulfoton and methamidophos products subject to this cancellation order is permitted only in accordance with the terms of this order, including any existing stock provisions.

EPA is modifying, establishing and revoking certain tolerances for the herbicides metolachlor and S-metolachlor and correcting the tolerance for guava (from guave) on bifenazate and buprofezin and 2,4-D on cranberry. The regulatory actions finalized in this document are in follow-up to the Agency's reregistration program under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), and tolerance reassessment program under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA), section 408(q).

EPA has authorized contractor, Syracuse Research Corporation (SRC) of Syracuse, NY, to access information which has been submitted to EPA under sections 4, 5, 6, 8, and 21 of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). Some of the information may be claimed or determined to be Confidential Business Information (CBI).

This notice announces the location and time for the Exposure Modeling Public Meeting (EMPM) and sets forth the tentative agenda topics.

EPA is announcing a public comment period and a public listening session for the external review draft document titled, ``Toxicological Review of Hydrogen Cyanide and Cyanide Salts: In Support of Summary Information on the Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS)'' (EPA/635/R-08/016). The draft document was prepared by the National Center for Environmental Assessment (NCEA) within the EPA's Office of Research and Development (ORD). The public comment period and the external peer-review workshop, which will be scheduled at a later date and announced in the Federal Register, are separate processes that provide opportunities for all interested parties to comment on the document. EPA intends to forward the public comments that are submitted in accordance with this notice to the external peer- review panel prior to the meeting for their consideration. When finalizing the draft document, EPA intends to consider any public comments that EPA receives in accordance with this notice.

NMFS is prohibiting directed fishing for Pacific sardine off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and California. This action is necessary because the directed harvest allocation total for the third seasonal period (September 15- December 31) is projected to be reached by the effective date of the rule. From the effective date of this rule until December 31, 2009, Pacific sardine can only be harvested as part of the live bait fishery or incidental to other fisheries; the incidental harvest of Pacific sardine is limited to 20-percent by weight of all fish per trip. Fishing vessels must be at shore and in the process of offloading at 12:01 am Pacific Daylight Time on date of closure.

EPA's grant regulations (40 CFR 35.115) require the Agency to evaluate the performance of agencies which receive grants. EPA's regulations for regional consistency (40 CFR 56.7) require that the Agency notify the public of the availability of the reports of such evaluations. EPA performed end-of-year evaluations of eight state air pollution control programs (Alabama Department of Environmental Management; Florida Department of Environmental Protection; Georgia Department of Natural Resources; Commonwealth of Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection; Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality; North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources; South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control; and Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation) and 16 local programs (City of Huntsville Division of Natural Resources, AL; Jefferson County Department of Health, AL; Broward County Environmental Protection Department, FL; City of Jacksonville Environmental Quality Division, FL; Hillsborough County Environmental Protection Commission, FL; Miami-Dade County Air Quality Management Division, FL; Palm Beach County Health Department, FL; Pinellas County Department of Environmental Management, FL; Louisville/Jefferson County Metro Government, KY; Forsyth County Environmental Affairs Department, NC; Mecklenburg County Land Use and Environmental Services Agency, NC; Western North Carolina Regional Air Quality Agency, NC; Chattanooga- Hamilton County Air Pollution Control Bureau, TN; Memphis-Shelby County Health Department, TN; Knox County Department of Air Quality Management, TN; and Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County Public Health Department, TN). The 24 evaluations were conducted to assess the agencies' Fiscal Year 2008 performance under the grants awarded by EPA under authority of section 105 of the Clean Air Act. EPA Region 4 has prepared reports for each agency identified above and these reports are now available for public inspection.

EPA is proposing to approve a portion of the State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision submitted by the State of Alabama, through the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM), on March 7, 2007. This action proposes to approve the portion of the March

The Department of Labor, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden conducts a pre-clearance consultation program to provide the general public and Federal agencies with an opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing collections of information in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA95) [44 U.S.C. 3506 (c)(2)(A)]. This program helps to ensure that requested data can be provided in the desired format, reporting burden (time and financial resources) is minimized, collection instruments are clearly understood, and the impact of collection requirements on respondents can be properly assessed.

We, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service), announce the availability of our Post-Delisting Monitoring Plan for the Concho water snake (Nerodia paucimaculata). The draft post-delisting monitoring (PDM) plan describes the methods we propose to monitor the status of the snake and its habitat, in cooperation with the State of Texas and other conservation partners, for a 15-year period if we remove this species from the Federal list of endangered and threatened wildlife under another pending action. The draft PDM plan also provides a strategy for identifying and responding to any future population declines or habitat alterations.

Pursuant to United States Code, Title 31, section 5135(b)(8)(C), the United States Mint announces the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC) public meeting scheduled for September 22, 2009.

On September 16, 2009, the Export Trading Company Affairs Office, International Trade Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, issued an amended Export Trade Certificate of Review (``Certificate'') to Northwest Fruit Exporters (``NFE'').

This final rule incorporates into the Senior Farmers' Market Nutrition Program regulations, statutory provisions set forth in Section 4231 of the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 (Pub. L. 110-246, also known as the Farm Bill of 2008). The three provisions include adding honey as an eligible food for purchase with Senior Farmers' Market Nutrition Program (SFMNP) benefits, prohibiting the value of SFMNP benefits from consideration as income or resources when determining eligibility for other programs under any Federal, State or local law, and prohibiting the collection of State or local tax on a purchase of food with a benefit distributed under the SFMNP.