1-1 SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
1-2 WHEREAS, Air pollution has a potentially serious impact on
1-3 the health of many Americans, including a majority of the nearly 21
1-4 million residents of the State of Texas, and is a matter of concern
1-5 to both federal and state governments, which share a responsibility
1-6 to clean up the environment and protect the public health; and
1-7 WHEREAS, In metropolitan areas where the problem is most
1-8 severe, achieving federally mandated reductions in the emission of
1-9 certain pollutants within the time lines established by the United
1-10 States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will be possible only
1-11 through an appropriate combination of federal, state, and local
1-12 actions, including not only stringent local and state emission
1-13 controls but also the timely implementation of federal controls;
1-14 and
1-15 WHEREAS, Emissions may be regulated by either the state's
1-16 environmental regulation agency or the federal government,
1-17 depending on their origin; and
1-18 WHEREAS, For example, emissions from an industrial facility,
1-19 such as a utility company or petroleum refinery, are subject to
1-20 state regulations, while gasoline and diesel fuel standards and
1-21 emissions from aircraft, airport ground support equipment,
1-22 automobiles, trucks, marine engines, and locomotives are all
1-23 federally controlled; and
1-24 WHEREAS, Under recent federal action, the EPA will require
1-25 buses and commercial trucks to produce 95 percent less pollution
2-1 than today's buses and trucks and will require the amount of sulfur
2-2 in diesel fuel to be reduced by 97 percent; these measures alone
2-3 are expected to cut air pollution by as much as 95 percent; and
2-4 WHEREAS, At issue is the fact that the low-sulfur diesel fuel
2-5 provisions will not go into effect before 2006, and diesel fuel
2-6 engine manufacturers will have flexibility in meeting the new
2-7 emission standards due to phase in between 2007 and 2010; the slow
2-8 rate of turnover among commercial fleets means that these federal
2-9 emission control measures will likely have little effect until
2-10 several years after that, when a sufficient number of these trucks
2-11 and buses are in operation; and
2-12 WHEREAS, Currently, the State of Texas has nine metropolitan
2-13 areas that either have been designated as nonattainment areas by
2-14 the EPA or are close to exceeding the National Ambient Air Quality
2-15 Standards (NAAQS) for one or more of the regulated pollutants;
2-16 these nonattainment or near-nonattainment areas have been given
2-17 strict time lines for their emission reduction efforts based on the
2-18 severity of pollution in the area; and
2-19 WHEREAS, Because of the lengthy time line for the reduction
2-20 of emissions from federally controlled sources, the federally
2-21 mandated attainment date for some NAAQS nonattainment regions in
2-22 Texas, such as the Houston-Galveston-Brazoria area, will arrive
2-23 long before the effects of federal air quality improvement efforts
2-24 can be realized; and
2-25 WHEREAS, Texas is forced to require state-controlled emission
2-26 sources to make significant reductions in pollution in a relatively
3-1 short period of time while federally controlled sources continue to
3-2 contaminate the state's environment; and
3-3 WHEREAS, The incongruence in the federal and state time lines
3-4 for emission reductions places an undue burden on the state to
3-5 lower air pollution significantly enough to be in attainment with
3-6 the NAAQS without a corresponding decrease in emissions from any of
3-7 the myriad federally controlled emission sources; now, therefore,
3-8 be it
3-9 RESOLVED, That the 77th Legislature of the State of Texas
3-10 hereby respectfully urge the Congress of the United States to
3-11 require federally controlled emission sources to reduce their
3-12 emissions by the same percentages and on the same schedule as
3-13 state-controlled sources; and, be it further
3-14 RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official
3-15 copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to
3-16 the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of
3-17 the senate of the United States Congress, and to all members of the
3-18 Texas delegation to the congress with the request that this
3-19 resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a
3-20 memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.
_______________________________ _______________________________
President of the Senate Speaker of the House
I hereby certify that S.C.R. No. 35 was adopted by the Senate
on April 11, 2001.
_______________________________
Secretary of the Senate
I hereby certify that S.C.R. No. 35 was adopted by the House
on May 23, 2001.
_______________________________
Chief Clerk of the House
Approved:
_______________________________
Date
_______________________________
Governor