Texas aims to clean Big Bend air by 2155

Texas aims to clean Big Bend air by 2155

Texas’ environmental agency approved Wednesday a plan for eliminating haze at Big Bend National Park, but only after acknowledging that it is too weak to succeed.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s plan — a requirement under the federal Clean Air Act — sets a target of 2155 for achieving natural visibility at the iconic park, missing the federal goal by 91 years.

“We look ridiculous by saying it will take us 146 years to achieve this,” Commissioner Larry Soward said.

Still, the three-member commission signed off on the plan in part to avoid tighter controls of pollution sources in Texas by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“It is somewhat of a charade,” Commissioner Bryan Shaw said. “But it has a chance of reducing undo burden on the state.”

Soward described the plan “as form over substance.”

“We’re checking a box,” he said. “We’re getting the EPA off our back for 24 months. But it won’t do anything to reduce one microgram” of pollution.

Big Bend’s majestic vistas — once visible from as far away as 100 miles — are now obscured by pollution from many sources, such as diesel trucks, dust, crop-clearing fires and coal-burning power plants in northern Mexico, Texas and the eastern United States.

Texas’ new plan blames Mexico and Central America for most of Big Bend’s dirty air, attributing 52 percent of the emissions that create the haziest days to points south of the Rio Grande.

“We only have so much flexibility,” commission Chairman Buddy Garcia said, adding that it’s unlikely that there will be less pollution from south of the border.

The 137-page plan does not include any new restrictions on sulfur dioxide emissions from Texas power plants, in part, because of the potential price tag .

TCEQ officials estimated that new pollution controls would cost more than $300 million with no “perceptible visibility benefit.”

The plan, Garcia said, is the best the EPA will get from the state.

But environmentalists expressed doubts about whether the plan cuts enough pollution to win federal approval.

“My first response was to throw a party in 2155,” said Mark Wenzler, director of clean air and climate for the National Parks Conservation Association. “But we’ll all be dead by then, so it makes it hard to plan.”

Wenzler said that Big Bend’s pollution problems are not insurmountable, considering regulators and scientists know more about its air than at most national parks.

“Now it’s a matter of political will,” he said.

matthew.tresaugue@chron.com