Environmental Protection Agency February 15, 2024 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is requesting comment on its plan to retroactively apply the approved modification of the Federal Equivalent Method (FEM) designation for the Teledyne Advanced Pollution Instrumentation Model T640 particulate matter (PM) mass monitor including the 640X option (hereafter T640 and T640X) to all of the PM with a diameter 2.5 micrometers or smaller (PM2.5) concentration data from the T640 and T640X monitors in the EPA's Air Quality System (AQS) that was reported prior to the modification. This update, which will be applied to the unmodified hourly PM2.5 concentration data in AQS using collocated ambient temperature when available, is expected to result in a much higher number of PM2.5 monitoring sites using the T640 and T640X FEM methods meeting the bias measurement quality objectives (MQOs). More details related to this update can be found in the document titled, ``Proposal to Update PM2.5 Data from T640/T640X PM Mass Monitors,'' located in the docket for this action and on the EPA's website at https://www.epa.gov/aqs/aqs-memos- monitoring-and-policy. Because of the importance of this air quality data for regulatory, scientific, and public use, the EPA is providing an opportunity for the public to comment on this update and the subsequent use of the updated data in regulatory and non-regulatory applications.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator signed an Order dated January 30, 2024, denying a Petition dated May 24, 2023 (the Petition), from Healthy Gulf and Sierra Club (the Petitioners). The petition requested that the EPA object to a Clean Air Act (CAA) title V operating permit issued by the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) to Commonwealth LNG, LLC, for its natural gas liquefaction and export facility located in Cameron Parish, Louisiana.