Air Plan Approval; Connecticut; Plan for Inclusion of a Consent Order and Removal of State Orders

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY <CFR>40 CFR Part 52</CFR> <DEPDOC>[EPA-R01-OAR-2023-0235; FRL-12018-01-R1]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Air Plan Approval; Connecticut; Plan for Inclusion of a Consent Order and Removal of State Orders</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing to approve a State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision submitted by the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (CT DEEP) to (1) remove State Order 7002B issued to Dow Chemical USA (Dow) in Gales Ferry on May 25, 1982 from the Connecticut SIP, (2) remove State Order 2087 issued to Pratt & Whitney Division of United Technologies Corporation (Pratt & Whitney) in North Haven on March 22, 1989 from the Connecticut SIP, and (3) add Consent Order 8381 issued to Thames Shipyard and Repair Company (Thames Shipyard) in New London, CT on December 3, 2021, to the Connecticut SIP. State Orders 2087 and 7002B addressed reasonably available control technology (RACT) for volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions and sulfur fuel content limits for Pratt & Whitney and Dow, respectively. Approving the Thames Shipyard Order into Connecticut's SIP would ensure RACT requirements with respect to VOC emissions from shipbuilding and repair operations continue to be implemented at Thames Shipyard. This action is being taken under the Clean Air Act. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Written comments must be received on or before July 8, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> Submit your comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPA-R01-OAR-2023-0235 at <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> or via email to <E T="03">kosin.michele@epa.gov.</E> For comments submitted at <E T="03">Regulations.gov</E> , follow the online instructions for submitting comments. Once submitted, comments cannot be edited or removed from <E T="03">Regulations.gov</E> . For either manner of submission, the EPA may publish any comment received to its public docket. Do not submit electronically any information you consider to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Multimedia submissions (audio, video, etc.) must be accompanied by a written comment. The written comment is considered the official comment and should include discussion of all points you wish to make. The EPA will generally not consider comments or comment contents located outside of the primary submission ( <E T="03">i.e.,</E> on the web, cloud, or other file sharing system). For additional submission methods, please contact the person identified in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. For the full EPA public comment policy, information about CBI or multimedia submissions, and general guidance on making effective comments, please visit <E T="03">https://www.epa.gov/dockets/commenting-epa-dockets.</E> Publicly available docket materials are available at <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> or at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA Region 1 Regional Office, Air and Radiation Division, 5 Post Office Square—Suite 100, Boston, MA. EPA requests that, if at all possible, you contact the contact listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section to schedule your inspection. The Regional Office's official hours of business are Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., excluding legal holidays and facility closures due to COVID-19. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Michele Kosin, Physical Scientist, Air Quality Branch, Air & Radiation Division (Mail Code 5-MI), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 1, 5 Post Office Square, Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts 02109-3912; (617) 918-1175; <E T="03">kosin.michele@epa.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> Throughout this document whenever “we,” “us,” or “our” is used, we mean EPA. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Table of Contents</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">I. Background and Purpose</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">II. Description and Review of Submittals</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">III. Proposed Action</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">IV. Incorporation by Reference</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">V. Statutory and Executive Order Reviews</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Background and Purpose</HD> On February 8, 1983 (48 FR 5723), EPA approved Connecticut Source-Specific State Order 7002B into the SIP. State Order 7002B, which controls SO <E T="52">2</E> emissions from combustion equipment by limiting fuel sulfur content, was issued to Dow on May 24, 1982. State Order 7002B is no longer necessary because most of the regulated equipment has been removed from the property and the remaining equipment is subject to more stringent regulatory requirements than those established in the Order. On May 25, 2016 (81 FR 33134), EPA approved a SIP revision submitted by the State of Connecticut on April 22, 2014 (which included supplemental submittals submitted on June 18, 2015, and September 25, 2015). The May 25, 2016, rulemaking established sulfur in fuel oil content limits for use in stationary sources. In addition, the rulemaking included a revision to the sampling and emission testing methods for sulfur content in liquid fuels. A sulfur in fuel limit for use in stationary sources was previously 0.5% sulfur by weight as required on or after January 1, 2002, but this limit was superseded by the more stringent fuel limits (0.3% Sulfur, by weight) required under Sec-19a (e) in the Regulations of Connecticut State Agencies (RCSA) Section 22a-174-19a (Sec-19a). <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  RCSA Section 22a-174-19a (c) required a sulfur in fuel limit (0.5% sulfur, by weight) on or after January 1, 2002. The May 25, 2016, SIP revision removed the requirement at Sec-19a (c) and established the more stringent limit at Sec-19a (e). See 81 FR 33134. </FTNT> State Order 8027, a single-source VOC RACT order, was issued on March 22, 1989, to Pratt & Whitney. On May 30, 1989 (54 FR 22890), EPA approved Connecticut Source-Specific State Order 8027 into the SIP. However, State Order 8027 is no longer necessary to implement RACT because the equipment subject to the Order has been removed from the property. The Order was rescinded by CT DEEP on November 8, 2016. On December 3, 2021, the CT DEEP issued Consent Order 8381 to Thames Shipyard. Consent Order 8381 requires source-specific VOC RACT to addresses VOC emissions from miscellaneous metal and plastic parts coating operations. On May 31, 2022, the CT DEEP proposed to revise the Connecticut SIP by removing State Orders 7002B and 8027 and adding Consent Order 8381 to the Connecticut SIP. In accordance with 40 CFR 51.102, to demonstrate satisfaction of federal public participation requirements, public notice of this proposed action was published on the CT DEEP website on June 6, 2022. Copies of the notice were mailed electronically on June 8, 2022, to the directors of the air pollution agencies in New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts, along with a copy to the Director of the Air & Radiation Division of Region 1 of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. In accordance with the public notice requirements, materials were available for review on the CT DEEP website. The public hearing scheduled for July 7, 2022, was cancelled because no one requested a hearing by the July 6, 2022, deadline. In accordance with the notice, the comment period was open through July 5, 2022. No comments were received. On July 19, 2022, the CT DEEP submitted the proposed SIP revision to EPA. On February 14, 2024, CT DEEP submitted a partial revision to its July 2022 SIP submission by removing the last clause of the last sentence of paragraph B.21 from Consent Order 8381 from consideration as a SIP measure. CT DEEP removed the last clause of the notification of noncompliance which states, “unless specifically so stated by the Commissioner in writing.” <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Description and Review of Submittals</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD2">State Order #7002B Issued to Dow</HD> CT DEEP issued State Order #7002B to Dow on May 24, 1982, to limit sulfur dioxide emissions from fuel burning sources located at the facility in Gales Ferry. The Order limited the sulfur content of fuel combusted in the units to 1% by weight. The Order also prohibited the concurrent operation of the Wickes boilers (E7C and E7D). During an inspection conducted by CT DEEP on April 20, 2022, it was determined that Heat Transfer Media Heater EA and EB, Cyclotherm Boilers E7A and E7B, and Wickes Boilers E7C and E7D had all been decommissioned and removed from the premises. Dowtherm Heater A and Dowtherm Heater B remain onsite and are owned and operated by Americas Styrenics, LLC. The Dowtherm heaters are identified as EU-1 and EU-2 in Americas Styrenics, LLC's Title V permit (Permit #092-0027-TV). On May 25, 2016 (81 FR 33134), EPA approved a SIP revision submitted by the State of Connecticut on April 22, 2014 (which included supplemental submittals submitted on June 18, 2015, and September 25, 2015). This revision established a more stringent sulfur in fuel oil content limit of 0.3% sulfur by weight for use in stationary sources (RCSA Sec-19a (e)), which superseded the previous limit of 0.5% sulfur by weight under RCSA Sec-19a (c). The revision also incorporated new provisions under RCSA section 22a-174-19b (Sec-19b) “Fuel Sulfur content Limitations for Stationary Sources” that limited the fuel sulfur content of distillate oil to 0.0015% by weight and residual oil to 0.3% by weight. Therefore, these regulations contained more stringent limits than the limit specified in State Order 7002B. In addition, the submittal included a more ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 29k characters. 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