Environmental Protection Agency March 13, 2007 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

EPA is proposing changes to EPA's regulations specifying the public hearing requirements for State Implementation Plan (SIP) submissions, identifying the method for submission of SIPs and preliminary review of plans; and revising the criteria for determining the completeness of plan submissions requirements to reflect the changes to the public hearing and plan submission requirements. EPA is also making administrative changes to update the addresses to several Regional offices. These proposed revisions will modify when state agencies are required to hold public hearings, modify the number of hard copies of SIP submissions required to be submitted to the Regional office and the administrative portion of the completeness criteria for plan submissions.

The EPA's Science Advisory Board (SAB) Staff Office is announcing three public teleconferences of the SAB Hypoxia Advisory Panel and its subgroups to discuss its draft advisory working report concerning the hypoxic zone in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 8 announces its intent to delete the Peripheral Operable Unit (OU) and Operable Unit 3 (OU 3), also referred to as the Offsite Areas, encompassing approximately 25,413 acres, of the Department of Energy (DOE) Rocky Flats Plant from the National Priorities List (NPL) and requests public comment on this proposed action. The NPL constitutes Appendix B of 40 CFR Part 300, which is the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan (NCP), which EPA promulgated pursuant to Section 105 of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). Rocky Flats Plant means the property owned by the United States Government, also known as Rocky Flats, Rocky Flats Site, or Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site (RFETS), as identified in Figure 1. The Rocky Flats Plant is divided into the Central and Peripheral Operable Units (Figure 2) which contain 1,308 and 4,933 acres, respectively, and OU 3 (Figure 3) which contains approximately 20,480 acres. The 3 referenced figures are available as described below in the section entitled Docket. EPA bases its proposal to delete the Peripheral OU and OU 3 of the Rocky Flats Plant on the determination by EPA and the State of Colorado, through the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE), that all appropriate actions under CERCLA have been implemented to protect human health, welfare and the environment and that no further response action by responsible parties is appropriate. This partial deletion pertains to the surface media (soil, surface water, sediment) and subsurface media, including groundwater, within the Peripheral OU and OU 3 of the Rocky Flats Plant. The Central OU will remain on the NPL and is not being considered for deletion as part of this action.