The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled unanimously that state and federal agencies acted properly under the federal Clean Air Act (CAA) when they approved the 25-year, $36 billion regional transportation plan for Atlanta in 2000.
At issue was a lawsuit filed by the Sierra Club and several other environmental groups in February 2001, alleging that the plan violated the CAA because its annual nitrogen oxide emission projections--a precursor to ozone--were too high to allow Atlanta to meet air quality regulations for ozone until 2005. The Court of Appeals rejected that argument, ruling that emission projections only need to be met in certain specified analysis years and do not need to be demonstrated each year. The first analysis year for Atlanta's transportation plan is 2005.
