EPA might miss rule deadline

WASHINGTON – The Environmental Protection Agency seems likely to miss a court-ordered deadline today for issuing new rules intended to improve the views and air quality in 156 national parks and wilderness areas.

EPA officials were considering on Thursday whether to ask a federal court to extend the deadline. They also were consulting with the advocacy group Environmental Defense, which sued the agency to meet cleanup goals that Congress put in place 28 years ago.

The EPA agreed in August 2003 to establish by today new rules on haze that would require states to impose limits on air pollution that drifts over national parks.

The rules would target 26 types of industrial facilities built between 1962 and 1977, Environmental Defense said. The haze is formed by the pollutants sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, which other EPA rules also aim to cut.