EPA Issues Title V Permitting Guidance to Ensure Certainty for American Businesses and Alleviate Permitting Backlogs
WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued guidance to streamline the Clean Air Act (CAA) title V operating permit renewal process, a move which will provide certainty for businesses operating across the country. The guidance reaffirms EPA’s long-term position that the agency’s state, local, and Tribal air permitting partners do not need to require or be provided additional information from the original title V application to meet CAA requirements when an entity is renewing an unchanged permit. Through the cutting of burdensome and unnecessary red tape, EPA’s permitting partners will be able to focus time and resources on permits with substantive changes, ultimately alleviating permitting backlogs and creating renewed efficiency.
“This guidance provides clarity that EPA’s permitting partners can focus and streamline their review efforts on what matters most, new permits and changing permits. The days of unnecessary red tape slowing down the permitting review process are over,” said EPA Assistant Administrator for Air and Radiation Aaron Szabo. “EPA is committed to making the permitting process more efficient and prioritizing cooperative federalism, all while maintaining environmental protections and statutory obligations under the Clean Air Act.”
Under the CAA, applicable stationary sources are required to obtain operating permits, known as title V permits, from the source’s respective air permitting authority. These operating permits must compile all applicable air quality requirements into a single, comprehensive permit and be renewed periodically, even if there are no significant changes to operations or requirements. EPA’s guidance clarifies that if a permit’s terms are unchanged, then there is minimal information that needs to be submitted under federal law for the permit’s renewal. This includes allowing applicants to essentially re-submit prior applications with an updated date, as well as cross-reference or incorporate material from previous applications. Additionally, EPA’s guidance encourages permitting authorities to focus the “Statement of Basis”—a requirement for all draft permits—on explaining new permit requirements instead of the legal and technical basis of every permit term. Today's announcement will provide EPA’s air permitting partners with flexibility and applicable stationary source owners with more certainty that permit renewal applications should not hold up progress when conditions have not changed. EPA has long supported streamlining title V renewal permit applications, and this guidance reaffirms prior communications on title V renewals.
The flexibilities identified in this guidance do not impact permitting authorities’ ability and discretion to request supplemental information necessary to implement and ensure compliance with other applicable requirements, or to determine the applicability of such requirements.
To read EPA’s new guidance, please visit: Title V Operating Permit Policy and Guidance Document Index.