EPA Rejects Fairbanks/North Pole Air Quality Improvement Plan

For immediate release: January 10, 2023
Contact: Jason Olds, Air Quality Director, 907-209-9967

Today the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed to disapprove the Fairbanks Fine Particulate State Implementation Plan (SIP). The North Pole and Fairbanks areas have a serious air pollution issue, caused primarily by residential wood smoke. The local communities, the Fairbanks North Star Borough (FNSB), and the State of Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) have been making progress on this contentious issue for 14 years despite EPA’s failure to oversee and certify wood stoves. These devices contribute nearly 90% of the health-threatening pollution that disproportionally impacts vulnerable populations.

"DEC is committed to bringing healthy air to North Pole and Fairbanks," said Jason Brune, DEC Commissioner. "However, we will not sit back and let the EPA mandate hundreds of millions of dollars of additional costs to Interior residents without associated health benefits. Our SIP highlights this commitment by focusing on the root cause of the pollution and developing a path forward that protects the community’s ability to use wood stoves while not breaking the bank."

Portions of the SIP were developed with local input targeting emission reduction from wood stoves, actions that will actually help the community achieve clean air. DEC committed to identifying the cleanest stoves for the community and looked to EPA’s national wood stove certification program for guidance. DEC uncovered a program in such disarray that EPA’s Inspector General’s Office opened an ongoing investigation. Despite requiring the local community use a broken tool to fix the air pollution issues, EPA is still proposing to disapprove the plan. "With this proposed disapproval, EPA is sending a clear message that the local plan is not good enough," said Jason Olds, DEC Air Director. "They believe the federal government and folks in Seattle know what is best for Fairbanks and North Pole."

At the heart of this proposed disapproval are incredibly costly control measures that the EPA will now mandate that won’t move the needle on the local air pollution issue. EPA wants to mandate the use of Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel (ULSD) for home heating oil at an incredible expense to Interior residents with limited health benefits, while also placing $100s of millions in additional costs to electric utilities within the nonattainment area. DEC’s plan showed that these control measures were too expensive, but with this proposed disapproval EPA is telling the community that these controls are affordable, required, and if not implemented EPA will penalize the community by withholding over $37 million in annual Federal Highway funding.

"Solving the Air Quality issue requires innovative and unique solutions, not cut and paste options from the lower 48," said Bryce Ward, FNSB Mayor. "Fairbanks and North Pole need solutions focused on cleaning the air by targeting the sources, not checking boxes. The SIP is our local approach to solving this complicated issue of poor air quality and not just meeting some bureaucratic standards."

EPA is also telling DEC to regulate boutique coffee roasters and any restaurant with a char-broiler in order to solve the residential wood smoke air quality issues. This is an incredibly difficult problem to solve. FNSB and DEC are here to help guide the community to clean, healthy air while preserving those unique attributes of interior Alaska. DEC and FNSB will be providing written comments to EPA regarding this proposed disapproval showing that this issue is best resolved at the state and local level. If the public is interested in providing comments, they can be submitted to Docket ID No. EPA-R10-OAR-2022-0115 at regulations.gov. The public comment period will be open through March 13, 2023, and a public hearing to be held in Fairbanks will be announced in the upcoming weeks.