Environmental Protection Agency July 1, 2016 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Environmental Protection Agency has submitted an information collection request (ICR), ``Pesticide Establishment Application, Notification of Registration and Pesticide Production Report for Pesticide-Producing and Device-Producing Establishments'' (EPA ICR No. 0160.11, OMB Control No. 2070-0078) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.). This is a proposed extension of the ICR, which is currently approved through June 30, 2016. Public comments were previously requested via the Federal Register (81 FR 5749) on February 3, 2016 during a 60-day comment period. This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments. A fuller description of the ICR is given below, including its estimated burden and cost to the public. An Agency may not conduct or sponsor and a person is not required to respond to a collection of information unless it displays a currently valid OMB control number.

The EPA's Environmental Financial Advisory Board (EFAB) will hold a public meeting on August 9-10, 2016. EFAB is an EPA advisory committee chartered under the Federal Advisory Committee Act to provide advice and recommendations to EPA on creative approaches to funding environmental programs, projects, and activities. The purpose of this meeting is to hear from informed speakers on environmental finance issues, proposed legislation, and EPA priorities; to discuss activities, progress, and Preliminary recommendations with regard to current EFAB work projects; and to consider request for assistance from EPA offices. Environmental finance discussions and presentations are expected on, but not limited to, the following topics: Household affordability challenges; small drinking/wastewater systems; public-private partnerships; financing pre-development activities; financing operations and maintenance costs at green infrastructure sites; financing stormwater and green infrastructure programs. The meeting is open to the public; however, seating is limited. All members of the public who wish to attend the meeting must register, in advance, no later than Monday, July 25, 2016. Registration is required for all members of the public to ensure an expeditious security process.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is approving a State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision submitted by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. This revision establishes an updated ten-year carbon monoxide (CO) limited maintenance plan for the New Jersey portion of the New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island (NYNNJLI) CO area which includes the following areas: Hudson, Essex, Bergen, and Union Counties, and the municipalities of Clifton, Passaic and Paterson in Passaic County. New Jersey qualifies for a limited maintenance plan, rather than a full maintenance plan, because monitoring concentrations of CO are less than 85% of the standard. In a limited maintenance plan, future-year projection inventories and transportation conformity budgets are not required. In addition, EPA is also approving the 2007 Attainment/Base Year CO emissions inventory and the shutdown of 5 CO maintenance monitors in New Jersey. The New Jersey portion of the NYNNJLI CO area was redesignated to attainment of the CO National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) on August 23, 2002 and a maintenance plan was also approved at that time. By this action, EPA is approving a second limited maintenance plan for this area because it provides for continued attainment of the CO NAAQS for an additional ten years. The intended effect of this rulemaking is to approve a SIP revision that will insure continued maintenance of the CO NAAQS.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is promulgating this interim final rule to adjust the level of statutory civil monetary penalty amounts for the statutes that the agency administers. This action is mandated by the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act of 1990, as amended through 2015 (``the 2015 Act''), which prescribes a formula for adjusting statutory civil penalties to reflect inflation, maintain the deterrent effect of statutory civil penalties, and promote compliance with the law. The rule does not necessarily revise the penalty amounts that EPA chooses to seek pursuant to its civil penalty policies in a particular case. EPA's civil penalty policies, which guide enforcement personnel in how to exercise EPA's statutory penalty authorities, take into account a number of fact- specific considerations, e.g., the seriousness of the violation, the violator's good faith efforts to comply, any economic benefit gained by the violator as a result of its noncompliance, and a violator's ability to pay.