EPA’s Californiacation of America: Tier 3 Standards

On Monday, March 3, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its Tier 3 regulations requiring U.S. refineries to further reduce their sulfur emissions from 30 parts per million to 10 parts per million beginning in 2017. EPA claims that to further reduce sulfur emissions would only increase gasoline prices by a fraction of a cent, but gasoline prices in the real world and the refinery industry refutes that claim. EPA says this plan follows California—and California has the highest gasoline prices in the continental U.S. The refining industry explains that gasoline prices could go up by as much as 9 cents per gallon because the regulation will cost the industry $10 billion(i) in equipment costs and $2.4 billion in annual compliance costs.[ii]