Dive Brief:
- A coalition of 10 states, the District of Columbia; Harris County, Texas; and New York City on Friday sued the Environmental Protection Agency for failing to implement a 2024 Clean Air Act rule strengthening National Ambient Air Quality Standards for fine particulate matter, also known as the soot standard.
- The EPA’s failure to issue air quality designations undermines cities’ and states’ ability to use the Clean Air Act’s tools to reduce fine particulate pollution, the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California states. Issuing the designations would restore those regulatory mechanisms and help local governments prevent the health and financial costs of air pollution, the plaintiffs say.
- “By ignoring the legal responsibility to uphold its own rule, U.S. EPA is willfully abandoning the agency’s duties under the Clean Air Act and putting lives at risk,” California Air Resources Board Chair Lauren Sanchez said in a statement. “We are taking action to hold EPA accountable to ensure everyone — no matter your zip code — has the basic right to clean, healthy air.”
Dive Insight:
The Clean Air Act requires EPA to set air quality standards for fine particulate matter from vehicle exhaust pipes, power plants and factories and to designate areas of the country in violation of those standards. In 2024, the EPA under President Joe Biden set new standards lowering the soot standard from 12 micrograms to 9 micrograms per cubic meter of air by 2032.
Republican attorneys general from 24 states and a coalition of industry organizations filed lawsuits with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit seeking to overturn the new standard a month later. California led a lawsuit to defend the standard in April 2024.
In November, the EPA asked the D.C. Court of Appeals to strike down the stricter limits.
Both cases are still pending.
California, Connecticut, Hawai’i, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Wisconsin joined the local governments in Friday’s lawsuit.
“Soot kills people. It causes heart attacks, triggers asthma, and cuts lives short – and the science on this is not in dispute,” Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield said in a statement. “Every family in this state deserves to breathe clean air and live without the threat of preventable illness, which is why we are fighting to maintain the strong environmental protections Oregonians expect.”
The EPA did not comment, citing its longstanding practice of not commenting on pending litigation.
