Opinion ID: 1190150
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Powers of the ARB

Text: We come, then, to the question whether the ARB has been granted the power to regulate the lead content of gasoline. As stated above, the district concedes that if the Legislature reassigned the power over fuel content to the ARB in the Mulford-Carrell Act, the ARB's authority would be exclusive, and rule 74 would be invalid. (3) Initially, in considering the powers of the ARB, we conclude that merely because its authority is expressed in terms of controlling emissions or setting emission standards does not in itself compel a conclusion that it is prohibited from regulating fuel content. The word emit means to send out: discharge, release (Webster's New Internat. Dict. (3d ed. 1961) p. 742.) The regulation of an emission may be accomplished either by mechanical means which control the pollutants released by an engine using leaded gasoline or by specifying the ingredients of the gasoline used in the engine. The mechanical device method has been characterized as a direct control of emissions and the fuel content method as an indirect control of emissions. (4) The crucial question is whether the Legislature intended to confine the board's power to control emissions to the mechanical device method. We find no such restriction in the Mulford-Carrell Act, and for reasons discussed infra, we would not be justified in implying one. The act sets forth a comprehensive regulatory scheme for the control of pollution generated by automobiles. Emission standards are defined as specified limitations on the discharge of pollutants into the atmosphere, (§ 39009) and the ARB is required to adopt emission standards for motor vehicles. (§§ 39052, subds. (m), (n), (o), 39052.5.) The Legislature has itself specified emission standards which it has found to be technologically feasible for certain pollutants, not including lead. (§§ 39100.5, 39101-39105.) These standards are expressed in terms of the amount of a particular pollutant which may be emitted by a vehicle of a stated size manufactured in 1970 and subsequent years. In addition, as we have seen, the ARB is required to adopt air quality standards, and it has done so for lead pollutants. Section 39276 calls on the board to endeavor to attain such standards. Significantly, section 39052.6 provides that the ARB may adopt and implement motor vehicle emission standards for the control of contaminants other than those specified by the Legislature, which the board has found necessary and technologically feasible to carry out the purposes of the act, and section 39051, subdivision (c), authorizes the ARB to adopt any regulations necessary for the proper execution of its powers. It cannot be denied that these provisions allow the board to adopt emission standards for lead and to implement the standards adopted. There is no express restriction in the statutes as to the manner in which that implementation may be accomplished, and we would be unjustified in implying a restriction to mechanical means in the light of the purposes of the act and the state of technology relating to the control of lead contaminants. The Legislature has declared the policy underlying the act as follows: the people of the state have a primary interest in the quality of their environment, which is being degraded by air pollution. (§ 39010.) The principal source of such pollution in many portions of the state is emissions from motor vehicles, and the control and elimination of these pollutants are of prime importance to protect public health and welfare. The goal for pure air quality is the achievement of an atmosphere with no significant adverse effects from motor vehicle pollution by 1975. (§ 39081.) In Clean Air Constituency v. California State Air Resources Bd. (1974) 11 Cal.3d 801, 814 [114 Cal. Rptr. 577, 523 P.2d 617], we observed that these provisions evidence the Legislature's determination that pollution control should be accomplished as expeditiously as possible. There is no dispute that at the time these ambitious goals were announced, the only means available to significantly reduce lead contaminants emitted by automobiles was by regulating fuel composition, since there were no mechanical devices adaptable to that purpose. It is at the very least highly debatable whether such devices exist today. [7] If we were to hold that the ARB has no power to regulate fuel content, we would be attributing to the Legislature an intention to deprive the agency of the only realistic means at its disposal to achieve the purposes of the act. The oil companies contend that many undesirable consequences would occur if lead is eliminated from gasoline, and that the Legislature has impliedly determined that the price of such elimination is greater than the benefits to be derived therefrom. Thus, it is asserted, the Legislature has decided that lead pollutants may be controlled only by the gradual phasing out of cars which required leaded gasoline [8] or by mechanical devices which will reduce lead emissions. They rely in this connection upon the Legislature's failure to adopt measures which would have reduced the lead content of gasoline or which would have permitted the ARB to regulate fuel content. We do not find these arguments persuasive. While there clearly are serious technical problems in eliminating lead from gasoline, [9] the ARB is limited to implementing only those lead emission standards which it finds to be necessary and technologically feasible. (§ 39052.6.) We are not concerned here with whether the ARB must actually undertake the administrative task of prescribing and implementing such standards, but only with whether it is forbidden to do so. The Legislature's failure to pass additional statutes cannot be deemed an express intent to prohibit the board from exercising the power it already had to specify fuel additives; such an implication would be unjustified in the light of the more reasonable inference that the Legislature did not intend to deprive the ARB of the only feasible means to achieve the Legislature's previously stated goal. (2b) It follows from the foregoing analysis that we disapprove Environmental Defense Fund v. California Air Resources Bd., supra, 30 Cal. App.3d 829. The district contends that it will be unable to comply with the federal Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. § 1857 et seq.) unless it is granted the power to regulate fuel content. It urges that, pursuant to a requirement that each state adopt and enforce a plan to achieve air quality (42 U.S.C. § 1857c-5), California has filed a plan in which it represented that the districts may regulate gasoline content, and that a denial of the district's authority would conflict with that representation. Since we hold that another instrumentality of the state, the ARB, may regulate fuel additives, this contention is unpersuasive. It is also claimed that our decision will render the district powerless to meet other federal requirements, such as the district's obligation to regulate vehicular traffic during air pollution emergencies (42 U.S.C. § 1857c-5(a)(2)(F)(v)) or to regulate the construction of facilities which would indirectly generate pollution from automobiles (42 U.S.C. § 1857c-5(a)(2)(B)). We fail to see that a determination the district cannot regulate fuel content will have any appreciable effect on such authorized activities. The question whether such regulations are within the district's power will depend largely upon whether they come within the prohibition against regulating automobile emissions. Nor are we concerned here with whether the district may regulate the recovery of gasoline vapors generated during the fueling of motor vehicles. There is no evidence in the record as to how such vapors may be controlled or whether the vapors are emitted from the vehicles or the gas pump apparatus. (1b) The judgment is affirmed.