Extension of Alternative Compliance Periods Under the Anti-Dumping Program

Today's direct final rule will amend the provisions that EPA promulgated on September 8, 2000, when we published a direct final rule allowing start-up refineries to apply for a conventional gasoline anti- dumping compliance period of longer than one year. Alternative compliance periods are available only to start-up refineries that are facing significant hardship in complying with the anti-dumping statutory baseline oxides of nitrogen (NO<INF>X</INF>) standard. Today's direct final rule will amend the alternative anti-dumping compliance period provisions to permit an alternative compliance period of up to seven years for start-up refineries owned by small refiners (but in no case extending beyond calendar year 2007), while requiring refineries to provide additional environmental benefits for any cumulative NO<INF>X</INF> deficits remaining at the end of the fifth or sixth calendar years of any alternative compliance period. A refinery with an alternative compliance period is allowed to produce gasoline that does not comply with the statutory anti-dumping NO<INF>X</INF> standard on an annual average basis, thereby generating a NO<INF>X</INF> emissions deficit in the early part of the alternative compliance period. However, the refinery must produce NO<INF>X</INF> emissions benefits before the end of the alternative compliance period that make up for these early deficits and that provide an additional environmental NO<INF>X</INF> benefit at least equivalent to the overall cumulative NO<INF>X</INF> deficit generated during the course of the alternative compliance period. To track its NO<INF>X</INF> compliance, the refinery must calculate its NO<INF>X</INF> emissions benefit or deficit on a quarterly basis using specified equations. This direct final rule would modify the method for determining a refiner's quarterly NO<INF>X</INF> emissions deficit or benefit for a refinery with an approved alternative compliance period, to account for ordinary seasonal variation in gas