By Cat Lazaroff

WASHINGTON, DC, May 16, 2002 (ENS) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, facing a lawsuit over a Clean Air Act loophole that let California farms emit thousands of tons of air pollutants without reprisals, agreed Tuesday to monitor and restrict farm emissions. The settlement will help clean up the air over California, which holds some of the most polluted air basins in the nation.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) signed a settlement agreement to resolve three consolidated lawsuits over California's permit exemption for agricultural operations under the Clean Air Act. A coalition of community, health, and environmental groups went to court in January 2002, seeking to bring California agriculture under the same permitting requirements as those faced by similar operations in the other 49 states.

California is the nation's largest agricultural producing state, hosting farms stretching over thousands of acres. (Photo courtesy Kern County Farm Bureau)

Tuesday's settlement requires the EPA to propose a rule giving the federal agency responsibility for ensuring that major agricultural sources of air pollutants in California obtain operating permits under the Act. The EPA would retain this authority until California modifies the state laws that exempt these large agricultural operations from federal permitting requirements.

EPA Administrator Christie Whitman described the settlement as "the best approach for resolving the lawsuit."

"It preserves the California programs for non-agricultural facilities, ensures reasonable time to address remaining issues and allows EPA to focus its resources and attention on the technical and practical difficulties associated with applying Clean Air Act permit requirements to the agriculture sector," Whitman added.

Giant factory style cattle feedlots in California produce mountains of manure. As it decomposes, manure releases volatile organic compounds that contribute to smog pollution. (Photo courtesy USDA)

But the environmental and community groups that challenged California's agricultural exemptions charge that large, factory style farms are responsible for a large portion of the pollution plaguing the state's agricultural valleys.

"Major agricultural sources of air pollution must be regulated if we ever hope to breathe healthy air in the southern San Joaquin Valley," added Tom Frantz, chair of the Association of Irritated Residents.

The Central Valley region of California, the state's agricultural locus, includes the San Joaquin Valley, one of the most polluted air basins in the nation. In November 2001, the EPA officially redesignated the Valley's ozone status from "serious" to "severe." Ground level ozone or smog forms during a chemical reaction between volatile organic compounds (VOC) and oxides of nitrogen (NOx).

Agricultural sources that will be subject to the permit program will include those that emit certain levels of either ozone forming pollution or particulate matter. For example, decomposing manure at factory dairy farms emits VOCs, while diesel irrigation pumps emit NOx.

The San Joaquin Valley contains three of the four most ozone polluted cities in the nation (Photo courtesy San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District)

The San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District recently ranked livestock waste, most of which comes from San Joaquin Valley dairies, as the second largest source of VOCs in 1999. By 2005, livestock waste will be the largest source. The California Air Resources Board found that dairies alone emit 10 percent of the Valleys total VOC emissions.

The American Lung Association, in its "State of the Air: 2001" report identified Bakersfield, Fresno, and Visalia-Tulare-Porterville - all in the Central Valley - as three of the five most smog polluted cities in the nation. Smog can worsen respiratory conditions like asthma, and has been linked to decreased lung function and capacity. Smog has a greater impact on children, the elderly, and people with respiratory illnesses.

"Asthma is now the leading cause of hospital admissions of young children in California, with over 7,000 children in Fresno alone suffering from the disease," said Anne Harper, an attorney for Earthjustice who was co-counsel in the lawsuit. "Now that California agriculture is no longer exempt from the Clean Air Act, it is going to have to become part of the solution instead of the problem when it comes to air quality in the Central Valley. This is an issue of public health."

The Clean Air Act gave the EPA the authority to intervene in California and force emissions cuts from agricultural sources. But until several groups filed suit over agricultural exemptions, charging that the agency was in fact required to intervene, the EPA let California grant the exemptions.

Many farms and feedlots use diesel water pumps that emit smog and soot pollutants. This equipment will require permits under the settlement. (Photo courtesy W.G. Equipment Enterprises)

The EPA also agreed withdraw its December 7, 2001, approval of California's Title V program, which grants exemptions to agricultural sources of air pollution. The EPA said its approval was due to "lack of data" about air emissions from farms and ranches, and said it planned to review air regulatory requirements to determine which, if any, should apply to agricultural facilities.

"This action will bring California into alignment with the other 49 states whose agricultural industries already operate under the Clean Air Act," said John Walke, director of the Clean Air Program for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The settlement will force the California legislature to either revise state law to end exemptions for industrial agriculture operations, or face federal sanctions that will affect the entire state.

Under the settlement, EPA will issue a finding, called a Notice of Deficiency, detailing California's failure to properly implement the Clean Air Act. The Notice of Deficiency starts a process that could have major impacts on California's economy - if the state fails to revise its agricultural exemptions, increased pollution offset requirements will take effect on November 15, 2003, and California will lose its federal highway funding on May 15, 2004.

Farm equipment and harvesting methods can contribute to air pollution. (USDA photo by Ron Nichols)

The three lawsuits over California's agricultural exemptions from the Clean Air Act were brought by attorneys from Earthjustice and the Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment on behalf of: the Association of Irritated Residents, Communities for Land, Air & Water, Medical Alliance for Healthy Air, Natural Resources Defense Council, Our Children's Earth Foundation, and the Sierra Club.

The settlement agreement is available at: http://www.epa.gov/region09/air