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Federal Register / Vol. 62, No. 28 / Tuesday, February 11, 1997 / Proposed Rules6375would achieve from fleet averagebaseline levels (when factoring in theexpected NO X compliance margin of 5percent). Such a petition would begranted based on the certifier’sdemonstration of infeasibility orexcessive cost, as determined by theAdministrator. The numerical NO Xemissions standard applicable to a givenengine family certified under this optionwould be established by emissionstesting five well-maintainedlocomotives in the engine family. Theaverage of the results of these five testswould then be used as the baselineemissions level and the applicable NO Xstandard would be set at a level 33percent below baseline. Once theapplicable NO X standard is determinedthrough this procedure, the certificationprocess would be the same as for otherTier 0 locomotives, as discussed later inthis notice. The Agency requestscomment on the appropriateness of andneed for this option, and whether Tier0 locomotives and locomotive enginesshould be excluded from the ABTprogram if this certification option isadopted. EPA specifically requestscomment on the need for this option inthe event that the railroad-based Tier 0certification provisions discussed in theengine family certification section ofthis notice are finalized. EPA believesthat a railroad-based certificationprogram would eliminate or reduce theconcerns expressed about the ability ofthe ABT program to allow theselocomotives to be certified because arailroad would have control over thelocomotives it operated and could betterplan for their remanufacture in a givenyear whereas a remanufacturer wouldhave to estimate the engine family mixthat it would remanufacture in a givenyear in order to plan its ABT strategy forthat year. EPA requests comment onother alternative plans for addressingthe issue of Tier 0 locomotives whichhave trouble meeting the Tier 0standards (either for reasons ofexcessive cost or infeasibility),including such options as allowing Tier0 locomotives under 2000 hp to certifyto the switch duty-cycle standards (andapplicable caps) only, and not requiringsuch locomotives to comply with theline-haul duty-cycle standards.Other Nonroad EnginesA second issue raised by themanufacturers is the replacement of anexisting tractive power locomotiveengine (i.e., repowering) with an enginegenerally used in equipment other thanlocomotives. Such engines are subject toEPA’s standards for nonroad enginesover 37 kW, and only a small percentageof the total production of such engineswould be used in locomotives. Thesmallest of these engines (under 1000hp) are likely to be used in locomotiveswhich are in captive use movingmaterials and equipment withinindustrial sites, rather than being usedby railroads. Thus, their use is morelikely to resemble that of industrialequipment than locomotives. Therefore,EPA is proposing that such vehicles notbe defined as locomotives, and thereforewould not be subject to today’sproposed regulations. Engines in suchvehicles must be certified as meeting theover 37 kW regulations.Slightly larger engines (between 1000and 2000 hp) used for repowering aremore typically sold for use inlocomotives for railroad switchingoperations. EPA is concerned that itmight be overly burdensome to requiresuch engines to be certified to twodifferent sets of federal standards (i.e.,the over 37 kW nonroad enginestandards and the locomotivestandards), especially given the smallnumber used in locomotives. Further,the over 37 kW nonroad engineregulations provide emission reductionsthat are roughly comparable to theproposed Tier I standards forlocomotives. Thus, the Agency isproposing to allow manufacturers to sella limited number of these nonroadengines a year for use in locomotiveswithout specifically certifying to thelocomotive standards. Such enginesmust be certified as meeting the over 37kW regulations.In determining what an appropriatenumber of engines the Agency shouldallow to be sold for use in locomotivesunder this provision the Agencyconsidered an exemption that isincluded in the aircraft regulations. 12Aircraft, like locomotives, have anextremely low annual sales volumecompared to other mobile sourcecategories. In the aircraft regulations anexemption from the emissions standardsis provided for engine families of 20 orfewer annual sales, in a market withtotal annual sales of approximately1400. Using a similar ratio, the Agencyconsidered a range for this locomotiveprovision from 10 per year (whencompared to annual sales of freshlymanufactured locomotives) to 40 peryear (when compared to annualremanufactures). The Agency is thusproposing the midpoint of this range, or25 a year, to be the number of engines(between 1000 and 2000 hp) certified tothe over 37 kW regulations that can besold for use in locomotives.While EPA believes that the over 37kW regulations provide similar12 See 40 CFR 87.7(b)(1).environmental benefits as do theproposed Tier I locomotive regulations,based on the percent emissionsreductions from uncontrolled baselines,the Agency is nonetheless concernedabout the differences between the testprocedures proposed for locomotivesand those that currently apply to othernonroad engines (resulting fromdifferent duty-cycles) and the potentialenvironmental impacts of thosedifferences. Since the over 37 kWregulations do not apply to engines inthe 1000 to 2000 hp range until 2000,EPA currently has no way of evaluatingthose impacts because there are noengines meeting the over 37 kWregulations which can be used tocompare the results over the two testprocedures. Thus, as a condition ofbeing allowed to sell such engines foruse in locomotives, the Agency wouldretain the authority to require thattesting done for certification to the over37 kW standards also include testingdone at the locomotive power notchpoints. EPA will use this data todetermine the validity of this provision(i.e., allowing engines certified to theover 37 kW standards to be used inlocomotives) from an environmentalperspective, and may choose throughfuture rulemaking action to eliminate,limit or expand the availability of thisprovision on the basis of the data.The Agency believes that theprovisions for allowing some enginescertified to the over 37 kW standards tobe used in locomotives, as justdescribed, are reasonable for severalreasons. First, such engines are expectedto have emissions levels similar to TierI locomotive engines, but would mostlikely replace older locomotive engineswhich would otherwise remainuncontrolled (i.e., those in pre-1973locomotives) or be remanufactured tothe Tier 0 standards (i.e., 1973–1999locomotives). Thus, an emissionsbenefit is expected from these enginesrelative to the engines they replace.Second, this provision is limited toengines under 2000 hp which, due totheir lower power, tend to have lowermass emissions than higher poweredline-haul locomotives (which make upthe vast majority of both locomotives inservice and locomotive emissions).Finally, these engines are not expectedto have useful lives as long as otherlocomotive engines, nor are theyexpected to be remanufactured as manytimes throughout their service lives.These last two points would serve tominimize any unanticipated adverseeffects of this provision.The Agency requests comment onseveral aspects of this proposedprovision for repowering. Should the