This bill requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to establish the Early Action Compact Program, which allows an area that is not attaining the eight-hour ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) to obtain a deferment of a nonattainment designation upon the relevant state, local, and tribal government voluntarily developing an early action compact plan. The eight-hour ozone NAAQS measures ozone levels over eight-hour periods to determine the amount of ground-level ozone (i.e., smog) in the environment.
The EPA (1) must issue a decision on each early action compact plan no later than one year after it is submitted, and (2) may not designate an area as a nonattainment area until it has issued a decision to approve or deny a plan.
Under the bill, the EPA must establish separate requirements relating to winter ozone levels for each early action compact plan.