Issues: Oil & Energy

NRDC Urges Administration to Finalize Plan As Soon As Possible

• Diesel engines emit huge quantities of particulate matter (also known as "PM" or "soot"), which have been linked with increased asthma attacks and emergencies, cancer, endocrine disruption, numerous cardiopulmonary ailments, and premature death.
  
  
• Virtually all diesel particulate soot is less than one micron in diameter, i.e., small enough to evade our respiratory defenses and lodge in the deepest recesses of our lungs.
  
  
• The U.S. EPA and the World Health Organization's cancer research agency agree that diesel exhaust is likely to cause cancer.
  
  
• In midtown Manhattan, diesel engines emit more than half of the PM inhaled by New York pedestrians, even though gasoline vehicles outnumber diesel vehicles by ten-to-one in New York State.
  
  
• Diesel nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions contribute significantly to the nation's chronic summertime smog (or ozone) and acid rain, as well as to nutrient pollution in the Chesapeake and NYC drinking water systems, crop damage and forest impacts.
  
  
• More than 82 million Americans live in areas that do not meet the EPA's upcoming health standard for particulate soot. More than 122 million Americans live in areas that do not meet the EPA's health standard for daily exposure to ozone smog.

• The EPA's proposal will cover thousands of engines, ranging from 3 to 3,000 horsepower.
  
  
• The proposal covers: (i) more than 850,000 pieces of construction equipment such as bulldozers, backhoes, cranes, earth movers, and excavators; (ii) more than two-thirds of the nation's farm equipment such as tractors, combines, pumps, portable generators; and (iii) other heavy-duty vehicles and equipment like airport and port equipment. NRDC is strongly urging the EPA to add more stringent emission standards for locomotives and marine diesel engines.
  
  
• Heavy, nonroad diesel engines emit more deadly particulate soot than cars, light trucks, sport-utility vehicles, diesel trucks or buses combined.
  
  
• By 2007, these engines will emit roughly 70 percent of all vehicle-related particulate soot emissions and 46 percent of all vehicle-related nitrogen oxide emissions.
  
  
• Most heavy, nonroad engines have minimal, if any, emission controls. The EPA's first regulatory step to clean up these engines was not until 1996, and some of these engines are still unregulated.
  
  
• Currently, sulfur levels in nonroad diesel fuel are unregulated -- and average 3,400 parts-per-million (ppm). Sulfur in diesel fuel disables the most promising emission controls -- just as it was necessary to take lead out of gasoline to clean up America's cars, it is necessary to remove sulfur from diesel fuel to clean up America's diesel engines.

• When it is finalized and fully implemented, the EPA's proposal will cut 9,600 premature deaths annually -- almost one-third of the EPA's estimated annual particulate pollution death toll.
  
  
• While this proposal is extremely complex, the concept is actually quite simple: first, the EPA will require refiners to clean up their dirty diesel fuel by reducing their sulfur levels from the current 3,000 parts-per-million (ppm) to 500 ppm in 2007, and then to near-zero levels (actually, 15 ppm) in 2010. Then, once the fuel is clean, advanced emissions control technologies will be used to meet the new emissions standards.
  
  
  • Under the EPA's proposed standards, particulate soot emissions from most new heavy, nonroad diesel engines will be 95 percent lower -- and nitrogen oxide emissions levels will be 90 percent lower than today's engines.
    
    
  • For some of the smaller engines (engines under 75 horsepower), smaller emissions reductions will be achieved because of technical and cost concerns.
    
    
  • Even existing engines will be cleaner under today's proposal, thanks to the ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel.
    
    
• The health benefits of implementing this program are huge -- more than twice the health benefits of the "Tier 2" emission standards for passenger vehicles (enacted in 1999, 4,300 premature deaths annually) and more than the landmark "2007 Highway Diesel Rule"(enacted in 2001, 8,300 premature deaths annually).
  
  
• The proposal basically covers all five main groups of heavy, nonroad diesel engines, grouped by horsepower:
  
  
  • New engines below 25 horsepower will be regulated for the first time under this proposal.
    
    
  • New engines between 25 and 75 horsepower will be 50 percent cleaner, starting in 2008 -- and may be followed by additional reductions in 2013.
    
    
  • For new engines between 75 and 175 horsepower, 90-95 percent emission reductions would kick into place in 2012.
    
    
  • For new engines between 175 and 750 horsepower, 90-95 percent emission reductions would begin in 2011.
    
    
  • For new engines above 750 horsepower, 90-95 percent emission reductions would begin in 2011.

NRDC strongly urges the EPA to finalize its proposal, as soon as possible. Also, it is critical that industry lobbyists do not weaken the proposal -- by weakening the 2007 Highway Diesel Rule, exempting any engines from the final rule, or by creating emissions trading or other schemes that would reduce the environmental and public health benefits of the EPA's proposal. Moreover, this Proposal shouldn't be a Trojan horse for radical cost-benefit analyses promoted by the White House Office of Management and Budget that could undermine other important environmental and public health and safety programs.

Further, NRDC hopes to convince the EPA to add a supplemental program to require locomotives and marine diesel engines to use the ultra-low, 15 ppm sulfur fuel and to be equipped with comparably advanced emission control equipment as the heavy engines covered by this proposal.

last revised 8.12.03