ELR Citation: ELR 20137
No(s). 03-1039 (D.C. Cir. Jul 11, 2006)

The court denies a petition challenging a 2002 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule that revised certain nationwide limitations on water pollutant discharges from sources in the cokemaking subcategory of the iron and steel industry. A petitioner challenged four effluent limitations that apply to the recovery of byproducts from cokemaking, arguing that the final limitations and standards were not a logical outgrowth of EPA's proposed rule, thereby violating its right to comment under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and the Clean Water Act (CWA). But the right to comment under the APA on a proposed rule does not extend to a right to comment upon each application of the agency's announced rulemaking procedures, even if different applications may have significant consequences for the regulated industry, where, as here, the agency gave adequate notice of the procedures it intended to use, the criteria by which it intended to select data, and the range of alternative sources of data it was considering. And the petitioner's claim that it was deprived of its comment rights under the CWA is contradicted by the fact that it extensively participated in every stage of the rulemaking. In addition, EPA's determinations are based on a reasonable and consistently explained methodology and supported by the record, and it reasonably determined that the limitations were achievable.