Mobile sources of air pollution have been on the EPA's to-regulate list since the 1970s, when a series of amendments were made to the Clean Air Act, which was originally passed in 1963.
In order for the EPA to act to effectively clean up the airline industry, the United Nation’s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has to set a global emissions standard. Once an ICAO standard has been set, it would lay the groundwork for the EPA to set and implement a domestic standard of its own for aircraft based in the United States. Flickr Creative Commons/motox810
By Bill Picture
Published: July, 2015
Mobile sources of air pollution have been on the EPA’s to-regulate list since the 1970s, when a series of amendments were made to the Clean Air Act, which was originally passed in 1963. First on the agency’s agenda were cars and trucks, whose tailpipes emitted the lion’s share of the nasty smog-forming compounds in the air.
But now that vehicle-related emissions are largely in check, the EPA is ready to expand its focus. Last month, the agency announced it’s taking the first steps toward tackling another of the country’s large greenhouse-gas-emitting culprits—larger aircraft engines.
EPA felt a nudge to do this when a citizen petition was submitted by Friends of the Earth, Oceana, the Center for Biological Diversity and Earthjustice requesting that the EPA issue a greenhouse gas “endangerment finding” for aircraft engines and set appropriate emissions standards.
While the EPA announcement is cause for excitement, the proposed plan could accurately be described as a large baby step, as the process of regulating anything—particularly when the measures required to mitigate environmental impact could have short-term effects on the bottom line of a large industry—is a complicated one.
First things first
According to Christopher Grundler, director of the EPA’s Office of Transportation and Air Quality, in order to effectively clean up the airline industry, EPA must first officially determine that large aircraft are actually a bad-enough source of air pollution to warrant regulation under the Clean Air Act. Then, the United Nation’s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has to set a global emissions standard that’s applicable to every large aircraft engine, regardless of the aircraft’s origin and destination.
Once an ICAO standard has been set, it would lay the groundwork for the EPA to set and implement a domestic standard of its own for aircraft based in the United States. And the EPA-set standard could be even more stringent than ICAO’s, as EPA has been known in the past to do better than what the rest of the world’s governments consider acceptable when it comes to sources of air pollution.
Grundler says the EPA and Federal Aviation Association have been working to compile the data necessary to making this determination and help ICAO to develop some “meaningful” international standards. ICAO has been working on developing such standards since 1993, when recommendations to do so were set forth by the Kyoto Protocol.
“We have been at this for five years now, and there are a lot of resources and technical expertise involved in this process,” Grundler said. “It’s a time-consuming and complicated endeavor when you’re working with a number of different markets and nations, and a complicated business sector.”
The data they’ve compiled shows that U.S. aircraft contribute three percent of the country’s overall greenhouse gas emissions, and .5 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases. While those figures may not seem like a cause for alarm, at a domestic level they make aircraft the single largest air-polluting transportation source not yet subject to a U.S. emissions standard. Add to those figures the greenhouse gas emissions from aircraft based outside the United States, and Grundler says the problem is “significant.” Overall, aircraft contribute 29 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases.
“The measurement and testing regime were decided last year,” Grundler said. “Now we get into the meat of the process—timing and stringency and applicability. Those are big issues and that’s what we’re working on now.”
It’s important to note, however, that any future regulation, international or domestic, would apply only to commercial aircraft, along with some larger private aircraft. Smaller aircraft and military aircraft of any size would not be subject to the emissions standards, as these aircraft are not under the jurisdiction of the agencies involved in shaping the proposed standards.
The regulatory road ahead
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, an Obama appointee, is reviewing the EPA and FAA findings now. If she determines that larger aircraft engines are indeed polluting the air and need to be regulated, the public—including the airline industry and aircraft engine manufacturers—will have 60 days from that point to contribute its two cents to the debate.
EPA is working to have its preliminary endangerment findings to ICAO before next February, when the international agency is expected to announce global aircraft emissions standards, with an effective date of 2020. Grundler expects EPA to have a near-final report in hand within a few months of the ICAO standards being announced.
After that, the public will have another opportunity to weigh in before the final report is released and subsequent U.S. aircraft greenhouse gas emissions standards are shaped.
If all goes well, the ICAO standards would be adopted in the United States by 2017, with a possibly tougher EPA version to follow the next year. That means a U.S. set of standards will need a thumbs-up from the country’s next President.
Some question what will happen if the Republican Party, whom the League of Conservation Voters last year gave an “F” on environmental issues, nabs the White House. Still, Grundler is optimistic. “We see a light at the end of the tunnel,” he said.
And Grundler is excited to see how the future standards envisioned by the EPA will affect aircraft engine technology both in the U.S. and abroad. “We’ve done an enormous amount of outreach to the manufacturers,” he said. “They’ve been involved in this process since the beginning, because they hold a lot of data about current and future technology. And the standards should further drive innovation.”
If all goes well, the ICAO standards would be adopted in the United States by 2017, with a possibly tougher EPA version to follow the next year. Flickr Creative Commons/Donal Mountain
