2002 Annual Environmental Conditions Report
Preface
Illinois continues to build a better partnership with USEPA that more
clearly focuses on specific
environmental progress goals and communicates the results to the public
in a clearer and more concise
fashion. The 2002 Annual Environmental Conditions Report continues to
reflect the performance
measurement system jointly adopted by the Environmental Council of States
and U.S. EPA. number of
major accomplishments have been highlighted in this report:
-
The U.S. EPA ruled that the Metro-East area now meets the health-based,
one-hour ozone
(smog) standard. This ruling came as a result of a petition by the Illinois
EPA to classify the area
as achieving the standard. The petition was based on air quality measurements
and a thorough
analysis, which verified that the state’s pollution control program
had achieved sufficient
reductions to improve air quality conditions to the degree where the
one-hour ozone standard is
now attained. There is a U.S. EPA approved maintenance plan in place
to ensure the area
continues to attain the one-hour standard.
-
Emissions Reduction Market System (ERMS) Program - The ERMS program,
approved by the
U.S. EPA, allows emission reductions to be officially credited towards
the state’s effort to
achieve attainment of federal one-hour standard for ground-level ozone.
The program has
achieved its goals of significant reduction of pollutants while providing
flexibility and costsavings
to the industrial participants during each of the three years it has
been in operation. For
the third annual performance year of this program, once again participating
sources exceeded
the reduction targets for VOM.
-
Leaking Underground Storage Tank (LUST) Program - Illinois was one of
only ten states to
receive multiple U.S. EPA UST Fields Pilot Grants, which address abandoned
or underused
sites with underground storage tanks—the common type of brownfield
site. Additionally, this
was the second year, in over 16 years of the Illinois LUST Program,
in which more LUST
incidents were closed than new ones reported.
- Over $2 million in Municipal Brownfield Redevelopment grants
were issued to 23 communities.
These grants assist municipalities in redeveloping abandoned or underutilized
properties so they
can be returned to the tax roles.
- Of the total pollutant load discharged to Illinois' waters
in calendar year 2002 by wastewater
facilities holding Agency-issued National Pollutant Discharge Elimination
System (NPDES)
permits, 99.62 percent of the load was compliant, meaning it met
or was below the levels
allowed to be discharged by the NPDES permit. The percentage of compliant
loads discharged
in 2002 marks the seventh consecutive year of improvement. It is
important to note that Illinois
has already achieved in calendar year 2002 the planned 2005 program
objective of 99.5 percent
compliant load discharges.
- A recent amendment to the Environmental Protection Act included
a provision to align the
requirements of the state program with the national program. This
amendment provides that the
agreements we enter into at a state level may be executed with the
participants of the National
Environmental Performance Track program. This will allow the Agency
to continue to work
with the U.S. EPA in providing innovative alternative methods of
regulation that bring about
greater environmental benefits.
We hope this report provides useful information for the public and interest groups that have a stake in environmental protection.
October 2003
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