State of California
                            AIR RESOURCES BOARD
                                
                       State Personnel Board Building
                             801 Capitol Mall
                                 Room 150
                              Sacramento, CA
                                
                              June 24, 1976
                                10:00 a.m.
                                 AGENDA

76-11-1   Approval of Minutes Of May 27, 1976 Board Meeting

76-11-2   Public Hearing - Amendments to New Vehicle Standards
          Enforcement Regulations

76-11-3   Other Business
          a.   Executive Session - Personnel and Litigation
          b.   Research Proposals

76-11-4   Remarks from Audience

                        ITEM NO.:  76-11-2

Public Hearing to Consider Proposed Changes in the Regulations of
the Air Resources Board Regarding Enforcement of New Vehicle
Standards.

                          RECOMMENDATION

Adopt Resolution 76-25.

                             SUMMARY

The Air Resources Board currently audits new vehicle production
to independently check the emission performance of selected
engine families.  This audit program, known as "Title 13" or
compliance testing, involves the testing of from three to five
cars at the Board's El Monte laboratory for each engine family
selected.  The current compliance test procedures is not very
capable of detecting engine families with high emissions.  For
example, an engine family which has a 50% failure rate during
assembly-line testing still has more than a 50% chance of passing
Title 13 testing.

In order to improve the ability of compliance testing to detect
failing engine families, and to take into account the new
optional assembly-line quality audit test procedures, the staff
is proposing two statistical evaluation techniques to replace the
current Title 13 test procedure.  The new tests were discussed at
a workshop held with light-duty vehicle manufacturers on June 16,
1976, and there was a general agreement that the statistical
techniques would be a major improvement over the current
evaluation procedure.

There was no agreement, however, regarding the applicability of
the compliance test procedure.  The staff believes that any
engine family, or any subgroup within an engine family, should be
subject to compliance testing, whereas the manufacturers believe
that an engine family should be evaluated only as a unit.  The
staff believes the Board should have the flexibility to evaluate
subgroups in order to identify manufacturers who intentionally
calibrate certain subgroups (such as fuel economy or performance
leaders) to exceed the standards while calibrating the remainder
of their production slightly lower to achieve an overall passing
level.