Message from the Chair

Bernard Hawkins
Nelson, Mullins, Riley & Scarborough, L.L.P.
Bfh@nmrs.com

Time for an update on Air Quality Committee (AQC) activities. This year, the Section’s Annual Conference on Environmental Law (the Keystone Conference), was held March 13-16, 2003. It was a great conference and it provided a number of wonderful opportunities for air quality education. The first day offered the new concept of Technical Roundtables, sponsored by some tremendous consulting firms. One of these roundtable topics was “New Source Review Reforms: Technical Impacts on the Permitting Cycle” (presented by Environmental Resources Management). This roundtable was particularly well attended. During the conference, air quality was addressed in two panel sessions, from two different perspectives. The first panel session was entitled “Air Quality Mixed Bag: Four Hot Topics.” This presentation was a huge hit. The panel addressed the latest on traditional air “hot topics” ranging from Title V monitoring, certification and revision issues, implementation of new ambient air quality standards, nonattainment designations and ramifications, developments under the air toxics program, including a discussion of 112(j) issues, and an update on NSR reform and enforcement developments. The second panel session was “Superfungi: New Developments in Toxic Mold Litigation and Remediation.” Yes, I am calling this an air panel – indoor air, is becoming more and more a question being posed to air lawyers to deal with, including mold and other substances posing potential indoor air quality concerns. This panel provided an excellent overview of the problems in this area including the lack of standards for addressing mold, the difficulties in establishing standards, the insurance issues, the science issues and the status of important litigation and legislative activities. The session also included a great enforcement update addressing all media, including air (which certainly remains a focus at the EPA level).

Finally, the AQC tried a different concept for the Committee Roundtables. We asked Mark Stoler, manager of Environmental Health and Safety Operations, General Electric Company, and Matt Tanzer, Environmental Health and Safety counsel for Air Programs to discuss how General Electric uses Six Sigma to address air compliance issues. This was a great discussion and attracted the largest crowd I have witnessed for any committee roundtable (some 30 people, during prime ski time). The discussion was very valuable and 3stressed the importance of having a system in place to identify each opportunity for a potential non-compliance in a permit, having a system in place to address that opportunity, having a plan to implement that system (including backups) and having a way to verify the system has worked. This puts a company in a much better position for verifying compliance under Title V and for creating and maintaining a record verifying that the company conducted reasonable inquiry in certifying compliance.

If you did not attend the Keystone Conference, the materials are worth purchasing buying (contact the Section office at 312/988-5724). On a lighter side, the AQC offered a dinner get together for those interested in our committee and offered materials about what the committee does. Membership Vice -Chair Angela Morrison is to be congratulated for the success of these activities as we signed up a number of new members. I would like to express the AQC’s appreciation to the many individuals that made the Keystone seminar a great success. Mary Ellen Ternes (our own Newsletter vice-chair), was a co-chair for this program, so congratulate her and the others involved in planning this conference the next time you see them.

In addition to Keystone, the AQC has been busy planning for the 11th Section Fall Meeting (Oct. 8-12, 2003 in Washington, D.C.). Make plans to attend. We will offer a number of air quality panels on the main program. Also, we have in the works plans for a half-day stand-alone air program that will follow the main program and will be held Saturday afternoon, October 12. You don’t want to miss this one. It will offer some great air quality education opportunities. We will provide more details as this program develops.

In other efforts, we continue to focus on offering teleconferences. Special thanks to Matt Tanzer for leading the effort to organize a great teleconference presented on March 20, 2002 addressing “Proposed NESHAP for Industrial/Commercial Boilers and Process Heaters.” This was well attended. We also look forward to an NSR Reform teleconference that should be offered during April. Thanks to Julie Domike taking the lead on putting this together.

Other major efforts underway include finalizing edits to the “Clean Air Act Handbook, 2nd ed.” (special thanks to David Novello and Bob Martineau for this monumental undertaking). Roy Belden continues to update and provide new information on our AQC Web site. From the public service side, Jennifer Buzecky is working on a lesson plan that will be posted on our Web site that can be used to discuss air quality issues with school children to coincide with Earth Day. I encourage you to review this material and consider giving a talk.

This concludes the summary of major items underway on the AQC agenda for now. More details on these efforts follow below. Once again, I would like to thank the many individuals that are keeping this committee one of the best and most active in the Section. In addition, thank you for the many requests of new and existing members to become more involved.