Opinion ID: 2804920
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Uncertified Data Challenge

Text: Sierra Club first notes that, at the time of the designation process, the EPA possessed uncertified 2011 data for all areas. Because the agency’s regulations require the submission of 30 uncertified data within ninety days of the end of the quarterly reporting period, see 40 C.F.R. § 58.16(b), the EPA had all 2011 uncertified data in its possession by the end of March. It should have used that data, Sierra Club argues, notwithstanding the lack of certification. We are unpersuaded. While the uncertified data must undergo preliminary auditing and quality checks before submission to the EPA, see id. § 58.16(c), those preliminary quality control measures are just that—preliminary. As the EPA explains, the data remain subject to continuing checks and revisions by the states until final certification. Resp’t’s Br. 66. Accordingly, the EPA reasonably “does not presume that data [validation and auditing] processes are complete and accurate until” the final data certification. Id. at 46. Mindful of the significant deference we owe the EPA in matters concerning data quality or sufficiency, see Catawba Cnty., 571 F.3d at 41, we see no basis for second-guessing the EPA’s considered judgment on the issue. Sierra Club next argues that, even if the agency acted reasonably in refusing to rely on uncertified data, it acted arbitrarily in declining to delay the designation process until all states had certified their 2011 data by the standard May 1 deadline. After all, Sierra Club notes, the consent decree under which the EPA conducted the designation process allowed the agency until May 31, 2012, to promulgate the final designations. 2008 Designations Rule, 77 Fed. Reg. at 30,091. Sierra Club, however, identifies no authority obligating the EPA to wait until the last possible minute to promulgate its designations. And in this case, doing so would have made little sense. The EPA entered into the consent decree 31 precisely to settle allegations that it had already missed the Act’s statutory deadlines for promulgating the 2008 ozone NAAQS designations. See id. Accepting Sierra Club’s position would effectively call for the EPA to infringe the Act’s deadlines still further. In any event, as the EPA explained in denying Sierra Club’s petition for reconsideration of the designations after the May 1, 2012, certification deadline passed and 2009 to 2011 data were fully certified and available to the EPA, “[n]ew technical data become available on a regular basis.” Letter from Lisa P. Jackson, Adm’r, EPA to Robert Ukeiley, Counsel, Sierra Club enclosure p.2 (Dec. 14, 2012). The EPA reasonably concluded that delay “to consider such new information would result in a never-ending process in which designations are never finalized.” Id. Indeed, Sierra Club itself has already filed a petition for reconsideration based on 2010 to 2012 data. See Sierra Club Reply Br. 8. The EPA could reasonably conclude that the process must end at some point. We conclude that the agency did not act arbitrarily in ending it here. Cf. Catawba Cnty., 571 F.3d at 51 (“New York’s underlying complaint is that the iterations should have continued, perhaps ad infinitum. But such a process is inconsistent with the CAA: Congress imposed deadlines on EPA and thus clearly envisioned an end to the designations process.”). With that conclusion, and having reviewed the remainder of Sierra Club’s challenges and determined that they lack merit, we deny the group’s petition for review. See Catawba Cnty., 571 F.3d at 52.