Grand Canyon Times

Arizona State Senate President Warren Petersen, Arizona State House Speaker Ben Toma, and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to stop their new air quality act from being implemented. 

The lawsuit, filed on March 25 in the U.S. Court of Appeals, claims that the EPA’s proposed air quality requirement, the Reconsideration of the National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Particulate Matter, “exceeds the agency’s statutory authority and otherwise is arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, and not in accordance with law.”

Petitioners ask for the court to “declare unlawful and vacate the agency’s final action.”

The EPA’s suggestion for air quality requirements lower the primary annual PM2.5 standard from 12.0 µg/m3 to 9.0 µg/m3, but maintain the primary 24-hour PM2.5 standard and the primary 24-hour PM10 standard. The secondary 24-hour PM2.5 standard, secondary annual PM2.5 standard, and secondary 24-hour PM10 standard, would all stay the same as well. 

PM2.5 levels include particles that can come from smoke, vehicle exhaust, and emissions from industrial facilities and energy sources. The largest contributor to these factors is wildfires, “which account for 43% of all particulate matter in the air,” according to an Arizona State Senate press release.