Air Plan Approval; Texas; Vehicle Inspection and Maintenance Plan for Bexar County

<RULE> ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY <CFR>40 CFR Part 52</CFR> <DEPDOC>[EPA-R06-OAR-2023-0647; FRL-12276-02-R6]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Air Plan Approval; Texas; Vehicle Inspection and Maintenance Plan for Bexar County</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> Pursuant to the Federal Clean Air Act (CAA or the Act), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is approving revisions to the Texas State Implementation Plan (SIP) submitted to the EPA by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ or State) on December 18, 2023. The SIP revisions address Control of Air Pollution from Motor Vehicles and establish a Motor Vehicle Inspection and Maintenance (I/M) program for the San Antonio ozone nonattainment area. The revisions also update definitions and address options for displaying a vehicle's registration as proof of compliance with I/M requirements. Additionally, this final action terminates the EPA's requirement to promulgate a Federal Implementation Plan (FIP) for a Basic I/M program in the San Antonio nonattainment area. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This rule is effective on May 8, 2025. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> The EPA has established a docket for this action under Docket ID No. EPA-R06-OAR-2023-0647. All documents in the docket are listed on the <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> website. Although listed in the index, some information is not publicly available, <E T="03">e.g.,</E> Confidential Business Information or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Certain other material, such as copyrighted material, is not placed on the internet. Publicly available docket materials are available electronically through <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov.</E> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Mr. Clovis Steib, EPA Region 6 Office, Infrastructure and Ozone Section, 214-665-7566, <E T="03">steib.clovis@epa.gov.</E> Please call or email the contact listed above if you need alternative access to material indexed but not provided in the docket. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> Throughout this document “we,” “us,” and “our” means the EPA. <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Background</HD> The background for this action is discussed in detail in our October 11, 2024, proposal (89 FR 82550). In that document we proposed to approve revisions to the Texas SIP at 30 TAC Chapter 114, Subchapter A, Sections 114.1 and Section 114.2, and Subchapter C, Sections 114.50, 114.53, and 114.82), pursuant to section 110 and part D of the CAA. Consistent with the CAA section 182(b)(4) and title 40 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), part 51, subpart S, the revisions expand the State's vehicle I/M program into Bexar County  <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> and implement on-board diagnostics (OBD) inspections for vehicles subject to the I/M program requirements beginning on November 1, 2026. <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> In addition, the revisions incorporate minor changes for the display of a vehicle's registration insignia to include digital license plates. <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  The “San Antonio 2015 ozone nonattainment area” may also be referred to as the “Bexar County nonattainment area” and includes all of Bexar County. The surrounding counties in the San Antonio area: Atascosa, Bandera, Comal, Guadalupe, Kendall, Medina, and Wilson Counties are designated as attainment/unclassifiable. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  The State proposed to implement their Basic vehicle emissions I/M program six days earlier than the required deadline of November 7, 2026. </FTNT> We received comments on our October 2024 proposal from five commenters, and our responses to the comments follow. <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Response to Comments</HD> <E T="03">Comment:</E> The TCEQ requested that we correct footnote 7 of our October 2024 proposal, <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> which incorrectly stated that the revisions establish the maximum fee of $11.50 instead of the correct dollar amount of $18.50. <FTNT> <SU>3</SU>  See 89 FR 82550, 82552. </FTNT> <E T="03">Response:</E> We appreciate the TCEQ's comment and are making the correction in this final rule. <E T="03">Comment:</E> One anonymous commenter expressed concern that the associated cost of the program to motorists could hinder the implementation of the program. The commenter also suggested that the program should apply to commercial and large vehicle operators. <E T="03">Response:</E> EPA acknowledges the concerns raised by the commenter regarding the potential impact of the cost of the program to motorists. The TCEQ is responsible for setting and adopting the maximum vehicle emissions inspection fee for individual area I/M programs, and it addressed a similar issue during its public comment as discussed below. In Bexar County, the adopted fee of $18.50 was established in November 2023, which aligns with the maximum Onboard Diagnostics (OBD) fee of $18.50 applicable in the Houston-Galveston-Brazoria (HGB) and Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) program areas. This amount is consistent with the <E T="03">Bexar County Inspection and Maintenance Program Study Final Report</E>   <SU>4</SU> <FTREF/> that recommended an OBD fee for all program areas between $18 and $22. Additionally, under Texas Health and Safety Code (THSC), section 382.202(f), TCEQ reviews the vehicle emissions fee for the I/M program every two years to ensure the fees remain appropriate with the program. <SU>5</SU> <FTREF/> Further, residents of the county had opportunity to provide feedback on the program implementation and its associated costs during TCEQ's 45-day public comment period which closed on July 17, 2023. During the 45-day public comment period, the Alamo Area Council of Governments (AACOG), San Antonio Auto Service, LLC (SAAS), Official Inspection Station (OIS), Texas State Inspection Association (TSIA), Rema Investment Group, LLC (REI), and 13 individuals provided input to TCEQ on the maximum fees set for individual emissions inspections in Texas. AACOG commented during the TCEQ's public comment period that local elected officials were concerned about the impact the emissions inspection fee would have on residents. The TCEQ responded that the comments received were taken into consideration when setting said fees. <FTNT> <SU>4</SU>  Eastern Research Group, Inc., Bexar County Inspection and Maintenance (I/M) Program Study Final Report. Jun. 30, 2020. <E T="03">https://wayback.archive-it.org/414/20210528194434/https:/www.tceq.texas.gov/assets/public/implementation/air/ms/IM/2020%20Bexar%20County%20IM%20Prog%20Study%20Report.pdf.</E> </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>5</SU>  The latest fee analysis study can be found at <E T="03">https://www.tceq.texas.gov/downloads/air-quality/mobile-source/2024-im-fee-analysis.pdf.</E> </FTNT> With regard to the commenter's suggestion that commercial and large vehicle operators should also be subject to the State's vehicle I/M program, it is important to note that Texas' vehicle emissions I/M program only applies to gasoline-powered, passenger and light-duty vehicles—those with a gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR) of 14,000 pounds or less. Texas' I/M program is projected to reduce vehicle emissions of oxides of nitrogen and volatile organic compounds, which are precursors to ozone formation. Heavy-duty commercial vehicles (HDCV)—those greater than 14,000 pounds GVWR such as larger trucks, buses and freight vehicles (both diesel and gasoline-powered), are not subject to the same vehicle emissions inspection requirements under Texas' state program. States generally have limited authority to regulate emissions from HDCVs because these vehicles are often engaged in interstate commerce, which falls under federal jurisdiction. These larger commercial vehicles are, however, subject to federal emissions standards regulated by the EPA, <SU>6</SU> <FTREF/> rather than the state's emissions inspection program. <FTNT> <SU>6</SU>  40 CFR 86.007-11. </FTNT> <E T="03">Comment:</E> One anonymous commenter stated that an ongoing assessment of whether Bexar County is meeting the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) should be completed after the program's implementation, and that the NAAQS should continue to be re-evaluated every five years. <E T="03">Response:</E> Bexar County has three regulatory monitors  <SU>7</SU> <FTREF/> in place that provide a design value to compare with the NAAQS for commonly occurring pollutants known as criteria pollutants. These criteria pollutants are ozone, particulate matter (PM), sulfur dioxide (SO <E T="52">2</E> ), nitrogen dioxide (NO <E T="52">2</E> ), carbon monoxide (CO), and lead (Pb). These monitors operate daily and data from these monitors are posted on the TCEQ's website for access by the public. <SU>8</SU> <FTREF/> The EPA posts the annual design values (for comparison to the NAAQS) for Texas and all other areas of the United States with regulatory monitors for access by the public. <SU>9</SU> <FTREF/> The San Antonio ozone nonattainment area is classified as Serious and accordingly, must attain the 2015 ozone NAAQS no later than September 24, 2027. <SU>10</SU> <FTREF/> The CAA requires that, within six months following the applicable attainment date (including any extension thereof) for an ozone nonattainment area, the EPA shall determine, based on the area's design value (as of the attainment date), whether the area attained the standard by that date. <SU>11</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>7</SU>  See TCEQ, Texas Air Quality Modeling—Monitoring Sites, <E T="03">https://www.tceq.texas.gov/airquality/airmod/data/tx/site.</E> </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>8</SU>  For example, se ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 23k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━