American Trucking Associations, Inc. v. Environmental Protection Agency

American Trucking Associations, Inc. (American Trucking) (plaintiff), along with other state and business petitioners, petitioned for review of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) (defendant) National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for two criteria pollutants: particulate matter (PM) and ozone. In setting the new PM and ozone limits, the EPA (a) asserted quantifying an exact safe level for each pollutant was unnecessary; (b) accounted for an adequate margin of safety throughout its determinations; (c) included ample studies supporting the efficacy of the new eight-hour standard for ozone, including the consensus from the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC); and (d) took the varied opinions from CASAC members into account to set the 0.08 parts per million (ppm) new ozone limit, including the fact that no member supported a standard below 0.07 ppm and most supported a standard above 0.08 ppm. In challenging the new NAAQS standards, American Trucking argued (1) the EPA’s PM standard was arbitrary because it failed to quantify a safe level of PM; (2) the EPA failed to evaluate how the reduced PM level would react with other environmental pollutants and climate conditions; (3) the EPA failed to prove the original one-hour average primary ozone standard was less protective of public health than the new eight-hour standard; (4) the EPA reached inconsistent conclusions in setting the new ozone standard at 0.08 ppm instead of 0.07 ppm or 0.09 ppm; and (5) the EPA failed to account for the crop-yield damage caused by climate factors other than ozone.