1-1 By: Brown S.C.R. No. 35 1-2 (In the Senate - Filed March 7, 2001; March 12, 2001, read 1-3 first time and referred to Committee on Natural Resources; 1-4 April 5, 2001, reported favorably by the following vote: Yeas 4, 1-5 Nays 0; April 5, 2001, sent to printer.) 1-6 SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 1-7 WHEREAS, Air pollution has a potentially serious impact on 1-8 the health of many Americans, including a majority of the nearly 21 1-9 million residents of the State of Texas, and is a matter of concern 1-10 to both federal and state governments, which share a responsibility 1-11 to clean up the environment and protect the public health; and 1-12 WHEREAS, In metropolitan areas where the problem is most 1-13 severe, achieving federally mandated reductions in the emission of 1-14 certain pollutants within the time lines established by the United 1-15 States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will be possible only 1-16 through an appropriate combination of federal, state, and local 1-17 actions, including not only stringent local and state emission 1-18 controls but also the timely implementation of federal controls; 1-19 and 1-20 WHEREAS, Emissions may be regulated by either the state's 1-21 environmental regulation agency or the federal government, 1-22 depending on their origin; and 1-23 WHEREAS, For example, emissions from an industrial facility, 1-24 such as a utility company or petroleum refinery, are subject to 1-25 state regulations, while gasoline and diesel fuel standards and 1-26 emissions from aircraft, airport ground support equipment, 1-27 automobiles, trucks, marine engines, and locomotives are all 1-28 federally controlled; and 1-29 WHEREAS, Under recent federal action, the EPA will require 1-30 buses and commercial trucks to produce 95 percent less pollution 1-31 than today's buses and trucks and will require the amount of sulfur 1-32 in diesel fuel to be reduced by 97 percent; these measures alone 1-33 are expected to cut air pollution by as much as 95 percent; and 1-34 WHEREAS, At issue is the fact that the low-sulfur diesel fuel 1-35 provisions will not go into effect before 2006, and diesel fuel 1-36 engine manufacturers will have flexibility in meeting the new 1-37 emission standards due to phase in between 2007 and 2010; the slow 1-38 rate of turnover among commercial fleets means that these federal 1-39 emission control measures will likely have little effect until 1-40 several years after that, when a sufficient number of these trucks 1-41 and buses are in operation; and 1-42 WHEREAS, Currently, the State of Texas has nine metropolitan 1-43 areas that either have been designated as nonattainment areas by 1-44 the EPA or are close to exceeding the National Ambient Air Quality 1-45 Standards (NAAQS) for one or more of the regulated pollutants; 1-46 these nonattainment or near-nonattainment areas have been given 1-47 strict time lines for their emission reduction efforts based on the 1-48 severity of pollution in the area; and 1-49 WHEREAS, Because of the lengthy time line for the reduction 1-50 of emissions from federally controlled sources, the federally 1-51 mandated attainment date for some NAAQS nonattainment regions in 1-52 Texas, such as the Houston-Galveston-Brazoria area, will arrive 1-53 long before the effects of federal air quality improvement efforts 1-54 can be realized; and 1-55 WHEREAS, Texas is forced to require state-controlled emission 1-56 sources to make significant reductions in pollution in a relatively 1-57 short period of time while federally controlled sources continue to 1-58 contaminate the state's environment; and 1-59 WHEREAS, The incongruence in the federal and state time lines 1-60 for emission reductions places an undue burden on the state to 1-61 lower air pollution significantly enough to be in attainment with 1-62 the NAAQS without a corresponding decrease in emissions from any of 1-63 the myriad federally controlled emission sources; now, therefore, 1-64 be it 2-1 RESOLVED, That the 77th Legislature of the State of Texas 2-2 hereby respectfully urge the Congress of the United States to 2-3 require federally controlled emission sources to reduce their 2-4 emissions by the same percentages and on the same schedule as 2-5 state-controlled sources; and, be it further 2-6 RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official 2-7 copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to 2-8 the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of 2-9 the senate of the United States Congress, and to all members of the 2-10 Texas delegation to the congress with the request that this 2-11 resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a 2-12 memorial to the Congress of the United States of America. 2-13 * * * * *