Air Plan Approval; KY; Revisions to Jefferson County Control of Open Burning

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY <CFR>40 CFR Part 52</CFR> <DEPDOC>[EPA-R04-OAR-2023-0339; FRL-12355-01-R4]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Air Plan Approval; KY; Revisions to Jefferson County Control of Open Burning</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 Commonwealth of Kentucky, through the Kentucky Division for Air Quality (KDAQ) on behalf of the Louisville Metro Pollution Control District (Jefferson County or District) via a letter dated May 30, 2023. The purpose of the revision is to clarify that a fire for general agricultural production must be a controlled burn; to allow the use of District-approved accelerants to start certain fires; and to adjust paragraph numbering. EPA is proposing to approve the changes pursuant to the Clean Air Act (CAA or Act). </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments must be received on or before December 2, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> Submit your comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPA-R04-OAR-2023-0339 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> . 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. 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, 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> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Simone Jarvis, Air Regulatory Management Section, Air Planning and Implementation Branch, Air and Radiation Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 4, 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, Georgia 30303-8960. The telephone number is (404) 562-8393. Ms. Jarvis can also be reached via electronic mail at <E T="03">Jarvis.Simone@epa.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Background</HD> On May 30, 2023, <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> KDAQ, on behalf of the District, submitted changes to the Jefferson County portion of the Kentucky SIP for EPA approval. <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> In this proposed rulemaking, EPA is proposing to approve changes to Jefferson County Regulation 1.11, <E T="03">Control of Open Burning.</E> <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  EPA received the May 30, 2023, submittal on May 31, 2023. For clarity, throughout this notice EPA will refer to the May 31, 2023, submission by its cover letter date of May 30, 2023. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  The May 30, 2023, submittal also contains changes to Jefferson County Regulation 1.02, <E T="03">Definitions,</E> in the Jefferson County portion of the Kentucky SIP. EPA addressed those changes in a separate rulemaking. <E T="03">See</E> 89 FR 41319 (May 13, 2024). </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>3</SU>  In 2003, the City of Louisville and Jefferson County governments merged, and the “Jefferson County Air Pollution Control District” was renamed the “Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District.” However, to be consistent with the terminology used in the subheading in table 2 of 40 CFR 52.920(c), throughout this notice we refer to the District regulations contained in the Jefferson County portion of the Kentucky SIP as the “Jefferson County” regulations. </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. EPA's Analysis of Kentucky's SIP Revision</HD> Kentucky's May 30, 2023, SIP revision contains a version of Regulation 1.11, <E T="03">Control of Open Burning,</E> that was adopted by the District on March 15, 2023 (referred to as “Version 11” by the District). The District requests that EPA incorporate Version 11 into the SIP and identifies three changes in Regulation 1.11 between Version 11 and Version 10, the version of the rule currently in the SIP. The District's first proposed change adds the phrase “ <E T="03">i.e.,</E> a controlled burn” to Section 2.1.4 to clarify that “a fire for general agricultural production” must be a controlled burn. The District's second proposed change adds an exception to Section 2.4. Section 2.4 prohibits the use of tires, used oil, heavy oil, gasoline, diesel fuel, kerosene, or similar accelerants to start or maintain combustion of any fire described in Section 2.1. The proposed exception would allow the use of District-approved liquid accelerants to start fires for general agricultural production for weed abatement, disease control, or pest prevention or for recognized silvicultural, range, native grassland, or wildlife management practices that have been approved by the District pursuant to Section 2.1.4. District-allowed accelerants are petroleum products, and these controlled burns are typically ignited by using two gallons of gasoline and five gallons of diesel fuel per 25 acres. In the past five years, the District has approved 32 fires for general agricultural production for weed abatement, disease control, or pest prevention or for recognized silvicultural, range, native grassland, or wildlife management practices. EPA preliminarily agrees with the District's determination that there are no significant increases or reductions in the estimated level of emissions due to this revision. Any change in emissions due to the use of liquid accelerants for initiating and maintaining controlled burns is expected to have a de minimis impact on the relevant criteria pollutants ( <E T="03">i.e.,</E> ozone and particulate matter) and is not expected to interfere with any applicable requirement concerning attainment of the national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS). This revision was requested by prescribed fire practitioners and is reflective of typical practices for controlled burns. The District's third proposed change renumbers the paragraph breaks for subsections 2.1.8 and 2.1.9, and removes subsection 2.1.10. These numbering changes do not affect the language of the rule or otherwise have any substantive impact. Given the nature of this change and the other changes described above, EPA is proposing that the SIP revision will not interfere with any applicable requirement concerning attainment of the NAAQS, reasonable further progress, or any other applicable requirement of the CAA. <SU>4</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>4</SU>   <E T="03">See</E> CAA section 110(l). </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">III. Incorporation by Reference</HD> In this document, EPA is proposing to include in a final EPA rule regulatory text that includes incorporation by reference. In accordance with requirements of 1 CFR 51.5, and as discussed in section II of this document, EPA is proposing to incorporate by reference Jefferson County Regulation 1.11, <E T="03">Control of Open Burning,</E> Version 11, District-effective on March 15, 2023, which clarifies that a fire for general agricultural production must be a controlled burn; to allow the use of District-approved accelerants to start certain fires; and to adjust paragraph numbering. EPA has made, and will continue to make, these materials generally available through <E T="03">www.regulations.gov</E> and at the EPA Region 4 office (please contact the person identified in the “For Further Information Contact” section of this preamble for more information). <HD SOURCE="HD1">IV. Proposed Action</HD> EPA is proposing to approve the changes to Regulation 1.11, <E T="03">Control of Open Burning,</E> of the Jefferson County portion of the Kentucky SIP, submitted by the Commonwealth on May 30, 2023, for the reasons discussed above. The SIP revision updates the current SIP-approved version of Regulation 1.11 (Version 10) to Version 11. <HD SOURCE="HD1">V. Statutory and Executive Order Reviews</HD> Under the CAA, the Administrator is required to approve a SIP submission that complies with the provisions of the Act and applicable Federal regulations. <E T="03">See</E> 42 U.S.C. 7410(k); 40 CFR 52.02(a). Thus, in reviewing SIP submissions, EPA's role is to approve State choices, provided that they meet the criteria of the CAA. Accordingly, this proposed action merely proposes to approve State law as meeting Federal requirements and does not impose additional requirements beyond those imposed by State law. For that reason, this proposed action: • Is not a significant regulatory action subject to review by the Office of Management and Budget under Executive Orders 12866 (58 FR 51735, October 4, 1993) and 14094 (88 FR 21879, April 11, 2023); • Does not impose an information collection burden under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act (44 U.S.C. 3501 <E T="03">et seq.</E> ); • Is certified as not having a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities under the Regulatory Flexibility Act (5 U.S.C. 601 <E T="03">et seq.</E> ); • Does not contain any unfunded mandate or significantly or uniquely affect small governments, as described in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995 (Pub. L. 104-4); • Does not have federalism implications as specified in Executive Order 13132 (64 FR 43255, August 10, 1999); ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 13k characters. 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