Opinion ID: 400897
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Lifting the Moratorium

Text: 25 EPA contends that continued imposition of construction restrictions no longer serves Congress' purpose once a state is in substantial compliance with Part D and is firmly committed to remedying outstanding deficiencies on a specified schedule. Since Congress' primary goals of state attainment and reasonable further progress toward attainment will not be compromised by the conditional approvals (the delay in full compliance having been found not to prevent attainment or reasonable further progress toward attainment), EPA reasons that Congress would not want the ban in effect in the interim. We disagree. 26 Congress in passing the 1977 Amendments went beyond merely mandating attainment of air quality standards. That approach had already failed. In light of past experience, Congress determined that a firmer guiding hand was needed to increase the chances for ultimate success. Hence, Congress chose to specify the precise track it wanted the states to take in reaching attainment. The construction moratorium is an important ingredient in the statutory scheme. Congress recognized that a major weakness in the 1970 Act was the failure to assess the impact of emissions from new sources on state plans to attain air quality standards by statutory deadlines. Too often states had permitted new construction on the assumption that, prior to statutory attainment deadlines, emissions could be reduced to compensate for any increase in pollution. S.Rep.No.95-127, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. 55 (May 10, 1977). The construction ban thus not only provides incentive for states to adopt the route Congress believed would lead to success, but also helps prevent further deterioration in nonattainment areas from major new sources of pollution until a plan meeting all requirements of Part D is in place, cf. id. at 25. 27 The terms of § 7410(a)(2)(I), which is the statutory provision triggering the construction moratorium, are absolute and unqualified. Every SIP must provide that 28 after June 30, 1979, no major stationary source shall be constructed or modified in any nonattainment area ... to which such plan applies, if the emissions from such facility will cause or contribute to concentrations of any pollutant for which a (NAAQS) is exceeded in such area, unless, as of the time of application for a permit for such construction or modification, such plan meets the requirements of part D of this subchapter (relating to nonattainment areas) 29 § 7410(a)(2)(I). Similarly, § 7503(4) forbids the granting of permits for new major construction unless the requirements of Part D are being implemented in the nonattainment area, and § 7502(a)(1) describes the Part D requirements as a precondition for the construction or modification of any major stationary source. EPA itself has concluded that (t)he statutory language and legislative history indicate that the (moratorium) is automatic and mandatory under the Act and existing state implementation plans, and is not a new prohibition that can be imposed or withheld at EPA's discretion. 44 Fed.Reg. 38471, 37472 (July 2, 1979). 20 30 What little legislative history there is confirms our understanding of the moratorium provisions. The provisions did not emerge in final form until the Conference Committee Report. The conferees emphasized the relationship between approved Part D revisions and the moratorium: As a condition for permitting major new sources to locate in a nonattainment area, States are required to have approved revised implementation plans. H.R.Conf.Rep.No.95-564, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. 121, 157, reprinted in (1977) U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News 1502, 1537. The Conference Committee indicated that it adopt(ed) much of the Senate's approach to the nonattainment problem. Clarifying Statement of Conference Committee on P.L. 95-95, 123 Cong.Rec. H8662 (Aug. 4, 1977), reprinted in (1977) U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News 1570, 1573. The Senate's version of the ban had its origin in the recognition that a major weakness in the 1970 Act was the failure to control new source pollution. S.Rep.No.95-127, supra, at 55. 31 Congress has specified that the moratorium must remain in effect until a SIP revision fully complies with Part D. When Congress speaks as precisely as it has here, it is not for us or EPA to decide whether something else might be just or almost as good. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. v. EPA, 478 F.2d 875, 883 (1st Cir. 1973). Congress itself specified the techniques that it believed would lead to attainment and made them an inflexible precondition to major new construction. 21 By lifting the moratorium, EPA has legitimated, albeit on a temporary basis, a deviation from Congress' chosen path toward attainment. 22 And if an unconditional approval is not forthcoming, the ban will have been relaxed without the state's ever having adopted all the requirements Congress thought necessary for timely attainment. These are the sorts of chances Congress deliberately chose not to take in the 1977 Amendments. After missing the deadlines once before, the states were to take the route specified by Congress if they were to avoid the construction moratorium. 32 Because EPA has used the conditional approval mechanism to circumvent this one substantive requirement of the Act, 23 we vacate that portion of the final order that prematurely lifted the construction moratorium. 24 EPA remains free to lift the ban when it determines that a plan fully complies with the requirements of Part D, even though implementing details of a plan remain to be furnished. Cf. Friends of the Earth v. USEPA, supra. 25 The ban need not apply to major sources emitting only pollutants for which Connecticut is in attainment, 40 C.F.R. § 52.24 (1981), or for which Connecticut has a fully approved Part D plan, e.g., carbon monoxide.