EPA Gives Fairbanks Time to Fix Dirty Air

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Category: News

Created on Wednesday, 08 January 2025 14:37

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By JAMES BROOKS
Alaska Beacon
    An Environmental Protection Agency action expected today will unfreeze $150 million in paused Fairbanks-area road construction projects.
    In a draft public notice published Tuesday, the EPA said it is planning to suspend sanctions imposed on the state for its failure to acceptably deal with toxic air pollution that affects the Fairbanks North Star Borough.
    The EPA imposed those sanctions a year ago, and the state has since revised its air pollution plan. On Wednesday, the EPA is expected to state that the state’s revisions are acceptable and that the sanctions, which have affected federally funded road construction, should be lifted immediately.
    An EPA official declined comment ahead of today’s official announcement, which will be published in the Federal Register.
    State officials said they were thrilled by the EPA’s decision.
    “The fat lady hasn’t sung yet, but we are celebrating,” said Jason Olds, director of the Division of Air Quality in the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation.
    “It’s taken 12 years, I think, of planning exercises to get here. It’s spanned a few careers, some before my time,” he said.
    Fairbanks is located in a river valley and is subject to extreme temperature inversions that trap air within the valley at certain times of the year.
    Because Fairbanks is home to many wood-fired stoves, coal burners and older oil-fired furnaces, pollution — particularly small particles known as PM 2.5 — frequently becomes trapped within the valley, occasionally giving Fairbanks some of the worst air quality in the world.
    In 2009, the EPA declared that portions of the Fairbanks borough were failing to meet federal standards and required that the state draft a plan to fix the issue.
    The state submitted several draft proposals in the ensuing years, but the EPA ruled that those plans were inadequate, and in December 2023, after years of warnings, the agency imposed sanctions.
    Jackson Fox, executive director of Fairbanks’ lead transportation planning organization, said those sanctions froze work on federally funded highway projects, including at four sites on some of Fairbanks’ busiest roads.
    “They’re huge projects. In total, you’re looking at about $150 million of infrastructure improvements that could have advanced to construction for this coming summer, or maybe 2026 or maybe 2027 if our funding plan wasn’t frozen in place,” he said.
    In 2024, state officials revised their Fairbanks pollution plan and resubmitted it to the EPA in December.
    In today’s announcement, the federal agency plans to state that it “has preliminarily determined that Alaska has addressed the … deficiencies” in the prior plan, and that “relief from sanctions … should be provided as quickly as possible.”
    The announcement will open a 30-day public comment period, but in the interest of speed, the agency intends to lift sanctions immediately.
    If the EPA lifts the sanctions as planned, that’s exciting news, Jackson said.
    “If we get these projects on track … we can get $150 million of work on the street, and get contractors working and families paid,” he said.
    He said his planning agency will hold a public meeting as soon as today to advance progress.
    For Olds, the announcement is as much a starting line as a finish line. The state will have until 2027 to reach the EPA’s stated pollution goals. If not, the sanctions could return.
    That means encouraging Fairbanksans to switch to cleaner heat sources and avoid burning dirty fuel on days when the inversion is strongest.
    “We are going to depend on hearts and minds,” he said of attaining the federal goals by 2027. “There are some requirements, and we do conduct compliance enforcement with our regulations, but we need to see this thing through. It’s sobering to meet that attainment date, but certainly, that’s where we’re focusing now.”
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https://alaskabeacon.com/james-brooks

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