Outboard Boat Engines Face EPA Controls
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WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency said Monday that it will require new pollution controls on outboard-motor boats because they are a major contributor to air and water pollution.
The EPA controls will be phased in beginning in 1998 over eight years and likely will lead to the gradual replacement of the dirtier two-cycle boat engines with more sophisticated, cleaner-burning, four-cycle engines.
The estimated 12 million registered motor boats now in use are not expected to be affected directly, but newly built engines will have to meet the tougher EPA pollution standards.
Under the EPA regulation, manufacturers will have to begin reducing smog-causing hydrocarbon emissions beginning with 1998 model boats and motors. They will have to reduce such emissions by 75% of current levels by 2006, EPA officials said.
The new controls are the latest effort by the EPA to curb pollution on a variety of off-road gasoline or diesel burning engines.
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