San Joaquin Valley Unified Air Pollution Control District 

Rules 2020 and 2201, as amended September 21, 2006 

District’s Clean Air Act 110(l) Analysis 

Background

The District has submitted to EPA, through the state Air Resources Board, revisions to two rules 

to incorporate provisions of state law. Prior versions of both rules have been previously approved 

into California’s State Implementation Plan (SIP). EPA has asked that the District explain how 

these revisions do not interfere with the emission reduction commitments, or with the associated 

attainment demonstration, contained in the District’s attainment plans. While the information in 

this document is provided to add depth and detail, it is possible to make the following categorical 

statement: 

No attainment plan has been adopted by the District which relies on 

emissions reductions that depend on agricultural permitting requirements, 

where such permitting requirements are inconsistent with state law. 

Therefore, these rule revisions, which consist entirely of directly 

incorporating, by reference, state law regarding agricultural permitting 

requirements, can not possibly relax any attainment plan emission 

reduction commitment or any associated attainment demonstration. 

Specifically, the following changes have been made to District rules: 

Rule 2020, Exemptions, has been modified to incorporate by reference California Health 

and Safety Code Section 42301.16, which establishes a permitting threshold for 

agricultural sources of emissions in the state of California, at approximately one-half the 

federal major source permitting thresholds. For agricultural facilities with emissions 

below this state-mandated agricultural permitting threshold, Districts can only require 

sources to obtain permits if certain findings are made. 

Rule 2201, New and Modified Stationary Source Review, has been modified to 

incorporate by reference CH&SC Section 42301.18(c). This section prohibits Districts 

from requiring offsets of agricultural sources unless certain criteria have been met that 

allow such sources to bank emissions reductions from the same types of emissions 

sources. 

If EPA chooses to treat this SIP submittal as a revision to the SIP, rather than a correction of prior 

approvals, Section 110(l) of the Clean Air Act prohibits EPA from approving such a plan revision if 

it would interfere with any applicable requirement concerning attainment, reasonable further 

progress, or any other applicable requirement of the Act. 

The following is an analysis demonstrating that approval of these rules into the SIP does not 

interfere in any way with the District’s attainment efforts and does not relax any prior 

commitments contained in the District’s attainment plans. 

District Attainment Plans Never Relied on Ag Permitting Requirements

First of all, it’s important to point out that the District’s attainment plans (including demonstrations 

of reasonable further progress) have never relied on emissions reductions that required 

enforcement via agricultural permitting programs that would be contrary to state law. In fact, 

Districts and states are required by Section 110(a)(2)(E) of the Act to provide assurances that 

they have “adequate personnel, funding, and authority under State (and, as appropriate, local) 

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law to carry out such implementation plan (and (are) not prohibited by any provision of Federal or 

State law from carrying out such implementation plan or portion thereof)...'' 

Therefore, had the District adopted rules that relied on permitting authorities that were illegal 

under state law, the state Air Resources Board and the federal EPA would have been obligated to 

disapprove such plans. Neither ARB nor EPA have disapproved plans on this basis, and in fact, 

as of the date of this writing, at least two of the plans discussed in this document, the 2002 Ozone 

Rate of Progress Plan and the 2003 PM10 Attainment Plan, have been fully approved by EPA. 

Early Plans Did Not Anticipate or Commit to Reductions From Agricultural Sources

Early discussions of the District’s limitations on effectively regulating agricultural sources in light 

of the state agricultural exemption can be found in the plans adopted prior to SB700 modifying 

the exemption. For instance, see page 4-6 of the District’s SIP-approved 2002 Ozone Rate of 

Progress Plan, where the District mentions agricultural irrigation engines in a list of control 

measures that deserves further study, but notes as a potential difficulty, “State law precludes 

permitting these units, and a prohibitory rule would be difficult to enforce without permitting.” 

Later Plans Require Alternate Enforcement Techniques

In developing later plans, the District became convinced that reductions from agricultural sources 

would be required in order to attain air quality standards, and the related enforcement 

mechanisms became a vital consideration as rules were developed to implement those 

reductions. Where the District was prohibited by state law from permitting agricultural sources, 

alternate enforcement mechanisms were developed and adopted to assure these necessary 

reductions. The following are three more recent examples of District attainment plan 

commitments requiring reductions in agricultural emissions in the San Joaquin Valley, including a 

discussion of their respective enforcement mechanisms that were developed as a part of the ruledevelopment process: 

1. Rule 4550, Conservation Management Practices, was a commitment of the District’s 

2003 PM10 Attainment Plan, adopted in June of 2003 and amended in December of 

2003. Page 4-23 of the plan begins the discussion of the potential rule, and includes 

discussion of an enforcement mechanism that did not rely on permitting regulations. 

Rather, the District would require agricultural operations to submit Conservation 

Management Practice (CMP) Plans, which the District would then review and, after 

finding compliance with the rule, issue CMP Plan Approvals, which are detailed written 

documents that are enforceable by the District’s compliance staff. The rule was adopted 

in May of 2004. No permits are required for compliance with this rule, or to enforce the 

reductions that are generated by the rule – CMP Plan Approvals are used for this 

purpose. The District’s ability to permit these sources does not affect the District’s ability 

to assure that the reductions continue, and so these permitting rule revisions can have no 

affect on our ongoing compliance with our attainment plan commitments. 

2. Rule 4570, Confined Animal Facilities, was a commitment in our 2004 Ozone Attainment 

Plan (see page 4-19 for a discussion). In this case, during the development of the rule 

the District made the findings required by California Health and Safety Code, section 

42301.16, to allow the District to require permits of facilities subject to the rule. Nothing 

in the proposed rules alters our ability to continue to require permits of the affected 

sources, since we’re merely incorporating 42301.16 by reference, so again, there can be 

no affect on our ability to assure the reductions continue. 

3. Amendments to Rule 4702, Internal Combustion Engines – Phase II, to include engines 

used in agricultural operations, were also commitments of our 2004 Ozone Plan (page 4-

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15). The rule amendments were adopted June 16, 2005, and required that all affected 

engines be covered by one of two enforcement mechanisms, either a permit or a new 

registration requirement set up under Rule 2250, Permit Exempt Equipment Registration, 

that was designed specifically as an enforcement tool for equipment that is exempt from 

permitting, like engines on smaller farms. Nothing in the changes to Rules 2020 or 2201 

affects our ability to continue enforcing the reductions through one or the other of those 

mechanisms, so again we will continue to meet our attainment plan commitments. 

The consistent element in these examples is that the District took the necessary steps to assure 

that the reductions required by our attainment plans were enforceable, whether permits were 

allowed by state law, or not. The inclusion of references to these same existing state laws in 

District rules does nothing to affect those plans, the rules, or the enforceability of the plans’ 

reductions, and therefore can do nothing to affect the associated attainment demonstration. 

District Attainment Plans’ Permitting Commitments Are Consistent With State Ag Permitting Law

District attainment plans have historically discussed permitting requirements in a couple of 

contexts, and we will examine those areas of the plan as well, to look for potential relaxations 

related to ag permitting. First, the District’s plans generally commit to adopting any changes to 

Rule 2201, New and Modified Stationary Source Review (NSR), that are mandated by federal 

regulations applicable to the pertinent attainment classification. Second, the District’s plans 

include a discussion regarding the use of emission reduction credits as mitigation for increases in 

emissions allowed by new or modified sources of air pollution. 

1. Permitting Regulations:

Regarding the first issue, the District has never included in these plans any discussions 

of permitting requirements that exceed the authority allowed by state law (again, we 

cannot, as such a plan would not be approvable by the state or federal governments 

according to Section 110(a)(2)(E) of the Act). Plans adopted before January 1, 2004 

included no consideration at all of New Source Review requirements for agricultural 

sources. Plans adopted after SB 700 became law considered SB 700 fully applicable, 

including the small agricultural operation permitting exemption (CH&SC Section 

42301.16) and limitations on offsetting requirements (CH&SC Section 42301.18(c)). 

Therefore, no agricultural permitting requirements that are inconsistent with these state 

permitting laws have ever been included in any District attainment plan. 

2. Emission Reduction Credits:

As to the second permitting issue, District attainment plans have contained calculations 

with respect to anticipated ERC-use. In establishing the expected ERC-use for the 

period of each plan, the District attributes no ERC-based mitigation to the growth in 

emissions from agricultural sources, because state law establishes limits on Districts 

requiring such offsets, the very same limits that the District is currently proposing be 

incorporated into their NSR rule. Specifically, the growth in emissions is established by 

ARB’s area source inventory growth methodologies, but no mitigation of that growth is 

considered when determining the impact of the growth on the District’s ability to achieve 

the attainment with the respective standard, because state law prohibits requiring such 

mitigation (see Chapter 3 of both the 2002 Ozone Rate of Progress Plan and the 2003 

PM10 Attainment Plan, both fully approved by EPA; and see Chapter 3 of the 2004 

Ozone Attainment Plan and Appendix D of the 2007 Ozone Attainment Plan, neither of 

which has yet been approved by the EPA). To recap, ERC-mitigation of agricultural 

source emissions growth has never been anticipated in District attainment plans, 

because agricultural sources are exempted by state law from supplying such mitigation, 

and so incorporating that same state law, by reference, into District rules can have no 

affect on any attainment demonstration that incorporates ERC-use into its calculations. 

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Conclusion

The consistent point throughout this discussion is that the District considered state law applicable 

to agricultural operations in all respects as attainment plans were developed. The control 

measures, permitting discussions, and attainment demonstrations contained in those plans did 

not rely on permitting of agricultural operations for the enforcement of emissions reductions, 

except where permissible according to state law. Rather, they relied on alternative means, where 

necessary, to assure that the necessary reductions were achieved. The rule revisions discussed 

here merely create a consistency between District rules and those state laws that have always 

constrained the District’s historical actions, and it is therefore not possible for these rule revisions 

to affect the District’s attainment demonstrations. 

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