I may be in California, where maybe the marketability of a Japanese car is greater than other parts of the country, that you have picked an interesting place for an interesting test. Certainly if I were Honda I would develop that pitch. I am sure they can do it better than I can. I am not an advertising specialist or a PR man. It seems to me that the American automobile industry in the face of this record-really, people who are interested should read the consent decree and the confidential memorandum in full. Here is a record of 14 years of foot-dragging by this industry on this problem, documented by a memorandum of the Department of Justice, and reflected in the consent decree. It was entered into by the parties, the defendants, and they wouldn't have entered into it if there weren't substance to the charge. With that record, Honda could make a great sales pitch in California. It will be interesting to see whether they do. Maybe Honda can do more to get the American automobile industry in line than the U.S. Congress can. It will be interesting to see. We have gone 10 minutes over our deadline. I suspect tomorrow we will get into some of these questions even more deeply and thoroughly. We will meet at 9:30 instead of 10 to give us more time. [Whereupon, at 12:40 p.m., the hearing was recessed, to reconvene Tuesday, April 17, 1973, at 9:30 a.m.] DECISION OF THE ADMINISTRATOR OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY REGARDING SUSPENSION OF THE 1975 AUTO EMISSION STANDARDS TUESDAY, APRIL 17, 1973 U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC WORKS, SUBCOMMITTEE ON AIR AND WATER POLLUTION, Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met at 9:30 a.m., pursuant to recess, in room 4200, Dirksen Office Building, Hon. Edmund S. Muskie (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Senators Muskie, Randolph, Buckley, and Domenici. I thought I might begin this morning's hearings by reading a few excerpts from a commentary by an expert in this field by the name of Russell Baker. It is a column entitled "The Can't-Do Guys." It reads in part as follows: WASHINGTON, APRIL 16.—Those of us who were brought up with absolute faith in the absolute superiority of American mechanical skills cannot help feeling embarrassed about Detroit's performance in this matter of exhaust pollution standards. It isn't that the engineering failure is so humilitating, although it is bad enough when we read that Japanese industry can already meet standards Detroit says it will still be unable to measure up to by 1975. The Japanese! To anyone whose psyche is rooted in the 1930's, finishing behind the Japanese in a manufacturing exercise is like John Wayne being beaten up by Smiley Burnett. Still, that could be tolerated. We are older now than we were in 1939, and we have learned that nobody can win them all. What is insufferable, however, is that Detroit should not even be ashamed of itself-indeed, that far from being ashamed of itself. Detroit should mount a loud lobbying operation in Washington to call world attention to its defeat. I thought that might be a good morale booster for the automobile industry on this second meeting of these hearings. [The article referred to follows:] [From the New York Times, April 17, 1973] THE CAN'T-DO GUYS (By Russell Baker) WASHINGTON, April 16-Those of us who were brought up with absolute faith in the absolute superiority of American mechanical skills cannot help feeling embarrassed about Detroit's performance in this matter of exhaust pollution standards. It isn't that the engineering failure is so humiliating, although it is bad enough when we read that Japanese industry can already meet standards Detroit says it (107) will still be unable to measure up to by 1975. The Japanese! To anyone whose psyche is rooted in the 1930's, finishing behind the Japanese in a manufacturing exercise is like John Wayne being beaten up by Smiley Burnett. Still, that could be tolerated. We are older now than we were in 1939, and we have learned that nobody can win them all. What is insufferable, however, is that Detroit should not even be ashamed of itself—indeed, that far from being ashamed of itself, Detroit should mount a loud lobbying operation in Washington to call world attention to its defeat. For months it has been declaring that the American car industry absolutely cannot under any conceivable circumstances solve the hard engineering problem put to it by the Government. What it wanted. and what it got last week, was Government permission to be excused from having to solve that problem for a long time-forever, some people suspect. What's wrong out there in Detroit? They seem to have lost the good old American know-how, forgotten how to cut the mustard, misplaced the moxie. This, at any rate, is what they keep saying in Washington while trying to persuade the Government to make it easier for them. At times the force of their lobbying campaign suggests that Detroit may even be proud of its inadequacy. What a falling off is this. We hear it and think of the Seabees in World War II. The difficult they did immediately. Remember? The impossible took a little longer. There were can-do guys in those days, and there used to be can-do guys in Detroit, too. America was full of can-do guys not so long ago. Nowadays we have can't-do guys. Washington is perpetually filled with them, all looking for a Government handout, or a back-door appointment at the Justice Department, all leaning on the Congress and Pentagon and White House while their superb lobbying machines boast that they can't build an airplane, can't run a railroad, can't stop dumping their garbage in their own life's air. Inability to get results back at the plant doesn't seem to matter anymore. Nowadays, to get results you go to Washington. Can't-do guys do all right in Washington, perhaps because lobbying is one thing the can't-do guys almost always can do, and magnificently. Detroit may not be able to dispose of exhaust very neatly, but it can build a beautifully lobbying machine for selling Government the story of its own inadequacy. What is it in the Washington air that restores the energies of these once dynamic American manufacturers? Something there is that brings out all the old latent, half-forgotten ingenuity that seems to have abandoned them back in the home plant. Back in Burbank everything may seem hopeless. Engineers weeping and test pilots refusing to take the thing off the deck. But bring them to Washington and, suddenly, hopeless, half-dead men are leaping on the cocktail tables in $650a-day penthouse suites shouting, "I don't care how impossible it looks, boss! Our lobby can lick this problem!” Production, of course, counts for little in Washington. Here salesmanship, not production, has become the ultimate virtue. This is why companies that can't produce at the plant do it so well in Washington. The test here is seldom whether it will work, but whether you can sell it. And so long as you can sell it, who cares whether it works or not? Salesmanship-that's the stuff. In Washington, even corporate failure sells is boasted about loudly enough. To get results in Washington, as Pentagon contractors have known for years, you have to have good old American don't-know-how. Senator MUSKIE. Mr. Ruckelshaus, I think yesterday's hearing was a useful and helpful one. I understand that you would like to begin this morning's with a statement on the NO, problem and if you will proceed in your own way. STATEMENT OF HON. WILLIAM D. RUCKELSHAUS, ADMINISTRATOR, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY; ACCOMPANIED BY DR. STANLEY GREENFIELD, ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR FOR RESEARCH AND MONITORING; AND JOHN FINKLEA, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH CENTER, RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. Mr. RUCKELSHAUS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I indicated yesterday I would like to discuss the problem of nitrogen oxides today. Accompanying me are two gentlemen with whom I would hope most of the questions would be directed are Dr. Stanley Greenfield, who is the Assistant Administrator for Research and Monitoring, and the primary science advisor within the agency to the Administrator, and Dr. John Finklea, who is the Director of the National Environmental Research Center at Research Triangle Park in North Carolina. This center is one of four National Environmental Research Centers that we have established that deals primarily with health effects. Both of these gentlemen have impressive backgrounds. Dr. Finklea is an M.D., Dr. Greenfield has his Ph. D. in meteorology and both of them have a long background in dealing with the health effects of various pollutants, particularly air pollutants and I think they can provide to the committee the best testimony that our agency has as to the health effects of the various pollutants that we are dealing with today. They do have a presentation to make with some charts indicating some additional information. I would like to start off by making a short statement. The 1976 motor vehicle emission standard requires a 90 percent reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions calculated from an uncontrolled vehicle. The requirement of that standard is interwoven not only with the other motor vehicle control requirements of the act, but it is inextricably linked to the national ambient air quality standards. In our consideration of the 1976 nitrogen oxide standard we must not lose sight of the overall context, which includes the national ambient air quality standards. The ambient standards are premised upon an administrative determination of fact, i.e., what are the limits of constituents of ambient air beyond which health and welfare will be impaired. On the other hand, the motor vehicle emission standards are legislatively fixed and designed as necessary steps toward the achievement of the national ambient air quality standards. First of all, there is the question of how the health-related national air quality standard for nitrogen dioxide was derived. This standard was set at 100 micrograms per cubic meter as an annual average. The national standard itself was based largely on the results of 1968-69 study on the occurrence of respiratory illness among school children in Chattanooga. The air quality reference measurement standard used to monitor the levels of exposure in Chattanooga has since been shown to be unreliable for general use. When this became apparent last year, we initiated a reappraisal of the Chattanooga results using air quality data gathered by another measuring method in Chattanooga during a 94-482 0-73- pt. 1 - 8 period just prior to, and somewhat overlapping, the start of the study of schoolchildren. The nitrogen dioxide standard, therefore, is open to some question, but the uncertainties about it are all in a direction which indicates that it does adequately protect public health. We have, of course, inaugurated the necessary epidemiological, clinical, and laboratory studies to gain additional knowledge on both the long- and short-term effects so as to enable us to make a determinaton on whether any revision in the standard is warranted. Dr. Greenfield will dwell at some greater length on just what that necessary research effort is. Next, there is the question of the degree of nitrogen oxides control needed for attainment of the national standard. Our initial judgment on the extent to which the national air quality standard was being exceeded was based on measurements made with the same method used in the Chattanooga study. During our review of State implementation plans, State air quality control officials brought to our attention their belief that the reference method we had recommended was in error. At that time we called this to the attention of the staff of this committee and of the House Subcommittee on Public Health and Environment and further advised those staffs of our intention to attempt to verify the reliability of the method. This was last summer. Over the past year, therefore, we have been measuring nitrogen dioxide levels by various measurement methods at some 200 sites across the country, including sites in the 47 air quality control regions where we originally believed that the national standard was being exceeded. A full report on this study will be available very shortly. As indicated in my testimony, February 28, 1973, on the House side, on extension of the Clean Air Act and before other groups, nitrogen oxides may not be the problem we and this committee once thought they were. Our study shows that there are just two regions-Los Angeles and Chicago-in which nitrogen dioxide is a significant problem. It is expected that the measures to be taken to deal with the photochemical oxidant problem in Los Angeles, will also solve the nitrogen dioxide problem. Further, in the Chicago region, we estimated that the current Federal motor vehicle standards, coupled with transportation controls required to meet the oxidant and carbon monoxide standards for this region, will be adequate. To obtain the standard by 1975 elsewhere, it is clear that major cutbacks in nitrogen oxides emissions clearly are. not necessary at this time and will not be necessary during the next several years. Moreover, the exact level of nitrogen oxides control required to ensure continuing maintenance of the national standard cannot, at this time, be well defined. Given these circumstances, the Environmental Protection Agency shortly will reclassify all the air quality control regions, except Los Angeles and Chicago, which originally were judged to exceed the health-related standard. The effect of this reclassification will be to remove requirements for adoption of a control strategy for nitrogen oxides. States that have already adopted such a control strategy will have the option of modifying it. And in cases where the Environ |