Approval of Air Quality Implementation Plans; New York; Cross-State Air Pollution Rule; NOX Annual and SO2 Group 1 Trading Programs

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is conditionally approving a revision to the New York State Implementation Plan (SIP) addressing requirements of the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR). Under the CSAPR, large electricity generating units in New York are subject to Federal Implementation Plans (FIPs) requiring the units to participate in CSAPR federal trading programs for annual emissions of nitrogen oxides (NO<INF>X</INF>), ozone season emissions of NO<INF>X</INF>, and annual emissions of sulfur dioxide (SO<INF>2</INF>). This action conditionally approves into New York's SIP the State's regulations that replace the default allowance allocation provisions of the CSAPR federal trading programs for annual NO<INF>X</INF> and SO<INF>2</INF> emissions. EPA is conditionally approving New York's regulations for annual NO<INF>X</INF> and SO<INF>2</INF> emissions because, while the submitted rules do not fully conform to CSAPR, New York is in the process of making further revisions to its rules and has provided a commitment to finalize and submit them by December 29, 2017. Upon timely meeting of this commitment, EPA will propose to convert the conditional approval of the SIP revision to a full approval.