Revising Washington's State Implementation Plan
Visibility Requirements
The federal Clean Air Act requires states to review and, if necessary, revise their state implementation plans (SIPs) for visibility protection. The visibility SIP: Provides for continuing consultation between the state and federal land managers on implementing the visibility protection program; provides for a monitoring strategy for mandatory Class I federal areas (national parks and several wilderness areas) and the use of available visibility data; and contains a long-term strategy to make reasonable progress toward national visibility goals.
The Washington State Department of Ecology (ecology) has developed revisions to the SIP based on a review conducted in 1997. The review concluded the SIP is adequately dealing with visibility impairment under current rules, needs to be updated administratively to reflect rule changes that have occurred, and may need to be revised again to address new federal rules covering regional haze visibility impairment.
Ecology will hold a public hearing to receive comments on the proposed visibility SIP revisions at 2:00 p.m. on June 10, 1999, at the Department of Ecology Headquarters Building, Room OA 36, 300 Desmond Drive, Lacey, WA. Written comments must be postmarked no later than June 10, 1999, and should be sent to Maxine Willis, Department of Ecology, P.O. Box 47600, Olympia, WA 98504-7600.
For more information on the proposed visibility requirements prior to the hearing, please contact Gary Rothwell, (360) 407-6820.