California Air Resources Board

In response to Assembly Bill 617 (Chapter 136) (Garcia, 2017; AB 617), CARB established the Community Air Protection Program (Program) to reduce exposure in communities most impacted by air pollution. This first-of-its-kind statewide effort includes community air monitoring and community emissions reduction programs, early actions to address localized air pollution through targeted incentive funding to deploy cleaner technologies in these communities, and grants to support community participation in the AB 617 process. AB 617 also includes new requirements for CARB to establish a statewide strategy for emission reductions at the community level through additional emissions inventory reporting requirements, enhanced and targeted community-scale air quality monitoring programs, and utilization of the best control technologies for reducing emissions.  The Program’s strategy for achieving the goals setforth in AB 617, is further outlined in the Board-adopted Community Air Protection Blueprint (Blueprint, approved by CARB in September 2018), and in detail in Appendix F, including the expectations for supporting tools such as the Technology Clearinghouse.

Underpinning AB 617 is the understanding that community members are active partners with CARB and California’s 35 air districts in envisioning, communicating, developing, and implementing actions to clean up the air in their communities.  AB 617 requires CARB to establish and maintain a statewide clearinghouse that identifies the best technologies for reducing emissions, namely best available control technology (BACT), best available retrofit control technology (BARCT), and related technologies for the control of toxic air contaminants (T-BACT).  Furthermore, the Board-approved plan that governs the AB 617 program, the Community Air Protection Program Blueprint, requires the new Technology Clearinghouse to be used to identify rules, regulations, technologies, or practices that could offer emissions or exposure reduction opportunities within impacted communities.  

To support public needs while the Technology Clearinghouse system is developed, tools and data will periodically be released.  See our prototype release schedule for more information.