Approval and Promulgation of Implementation Plans; Arkansas; Approval of Regional Haze State Implementation Plan Revision for NOX

Pursuant to the Federal Clean Air Act (CAA or the Act), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is finalizing an approval of a revision to the Arkansas State Implementation Plan (SIP) submitted by the State of Arkansas through the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) that addresses regional haze for the first planning period. ADEQ submitted this revision to address certain requirements of the Clean Air Act (CAA) and the EPA's regional haze rules for the protection of visibility. The EPA is taking final action to approve the State's SIP revision, which addresses nitrogen oxide (NOX) best available retrofit technology (BART) requirements for the Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corporation (AECC) Bailey Plant Unit 1; AECC McClellan Plant Unit 1; the American Electric Power/Southwestern Electric Power Company (AEP/SWEPCO) Flint Creek Plant Boiler No. 1; Entergy Arkansas, Inc. (Entergy) Lake Catherine Plant Unit 4; Entergy White Bluff Plant Units 1 and 2 and the Auxiliary Boiler. The SIP revision also addresses reasonable progress requirements for NOX for the Entergy Independence Plant Units 1 and 2. In conjunction with this final approval, we are finalizing in a separate rulemaking, which is also being published in this Federal Register, our withdrawal of federal implementation plan (FIP) emission limits for NOX that would otherwise apply to these nine units.