Illinois Coal Operators Ass'n v. Pollution Control Bd.

• Decision Date: 27 November 1974
• Docket Number: No. 46413,46413
• Parties: , 7 ERC 1315 ILLINOIS COAL OPERATORS ASSOCIATION, Petitioner, v. The POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD et al., Respondents.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

Page 782

319 N.E.2d 782

59 Ill.2d 305, 7 ERC 1315

ILLINOIS COAL OPERATORS ASSOCIATION, Petitioner, v. The POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD et al., Respondents.

No. 46413.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Nov. 27, 1974.

Lord, Bissell & Brook, Chicago (R. R. McMahan and Stephen M. Murray, Chicago, of counsel), for petitioner.

William J. Scott, Atty. Gen., (George William Wolff, Asst. Atty. Gen., Chicago, Sheldon J. Plager, Roger W. Findley, Champaign and Russell R. Eggert, Urbana, of counsel), for respondents.

WARD, Justice.

The Illinois Institute for Environmental Quality, which was created by the Environmental Protection Act (Ill.Rev.Stat.1971, ch. 111 1/2, par. 1006), under the authority of the Act formed a Task Force on Noise in 1971 to draft suggested standards to be used for the regulation of noise. The suggestions of the Task Force, the personnel of which included members of the faculty of the University of Illinois in law, engineering and physiology and of a national accoustical consulting firm, were filed with the Illinois Pollution Control Board (the Board) early in 1972. Between June 1972 and May 1973 the Board conducted 16 public hearings throughout the State to consider the proposed regulations. The petitioner here, the Illinois Coal Operators Association, an unincorporated association of 11 coal-mining companies in Illinois, participated and offered evidence at the hearings. In July 1973 the Board adopted regulations to govern environmental noise. The Board considered that environmental noise comes from (1) stationary or 'property line' sources; (2) ground transportation sources; (3) construction site sources; (4) airport sources. The regulations which were adopted concerned themselves only with category 1, stationary or 'property line' sources. The respondents, the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and the Illinois Pollution Control Board, have stated that regulations are being prepared for categories 2, 3 and 4 and at a later date those regulations will be announced.

The petitioner filed a request under the provisions of sections 29 and 41 of the Environmental Protection Act (Ill.Rev.Stat.1971, ch. 111 1/2, pars. 1029, 1041) in the appellate court for a review of regulations which had been promulgated. These provisions state that any person 'adversely affected or threatened by any rule or regulation of the Board may obtain a determination of the validity or application of such rule or regulation' by a petition for review. (Ill.Rev.Stat.1971, ch. 111 1/2, par. 1029.) The authority of the petitioner to proceed under this section has not been questioned by the respondents and we need not discuss it. We granted the petitioner's motion to transfer the case to this court under Rule 302(b), Ill.Rev.Stat.1973, ch. 110A, § 302(b), 50 Ill.2d R. 302(b).

The first contention in the petition is basically that the Board in Rule 102 of Chapter 8 of its rules and regulations (hereafter Rule 102) has exceeded the authority to regulate which was conferred on it by the legislature.

The Board was authorized by the Environmental Protection Act to promulgate procedural and substantive regulations to govern refuse disposal and air, water, land and noise pollution. Ill.Rev.Stat.1971, ch. 111 1/2, par. 1027.

Referring to pollution by noise, section 24 of the Act (Ill.Rev.Stat.1971, ch. 111 1/2, par. 1024) provides:

'No person shall emit beyond the boundaries of his property any noise that unreasonably interferes with the enjoyment of life or with any lawful business or activity, so as to violate any regulation or standard adopted by the Board under this Act.'

Section 25 (Ill.Rev.Stat.1973, ch. 111 1/2, par. 1025), after authorizing the Board to adopt regulations prescribing 'limitations on noise emissions beyond the boundaries of the property of any person,' states: 'The Board shall, by regulations under this Section, categorize the types and sources of noise emissions that unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life, or with any lawful business, or activity, and shall prescribe for each such category the maximum permissible limits on such noise emissions.'

Rule 102 of the Board, which the petitioner questions, provides:

'No person shall cause or allow the emission of sound beyond the boundaries of his property so as to cause noise pollution in Illinois, or so as to violate any provision of this Chapter (these regulations) or the Illinois Environmental Protection Act.'

Rule 101(j) of Chapter 8 of the Board's rules and regulations defines noise pollution:

'The emission of sound that unreasonably interferes with the enjoyment of life or with any lawful business or activity.'

The contention is that the Board is not only attempting through Rule 102 of regulate emissions of sound which unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life or with any lawful business or activity, as the statute (section 24) authorizes the Board to do, but also is attempting to regulate any other emission of sound which the Board may choose to prohibit.

However, Rule 102 is not, as a reasonable matter, to be given the restricted and isolated reading the petitioner would give it. The prohibition of section 24 is against causing noise emissions that unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life or with a lawful business or activity. The basic violation was to be unreasonably interfering through noise with the enjoyment of life or lawful activity, and it is clear that it was contemplated by the legislature that the Board would adopt standard or regulations to define or identify noise emissions which constituted such unreasonable interference. This is evidenced by section 25, which specifically states that the Board shall categorize the types and sources of noise emissions which unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life or lawful business activity and calls for the Board to prescribe maximum permissible limits for noise emissions.

While Rule 102 is poorly composed, we do not consider that it should be read as the petitioner would have us do. We read it as prohibiting emissions that unreasonably interfere with life or activities, whether such emissions may be said to violate section 24 generally or whether they are emissions which more specifically may be said to violate a particular Board regulation (as referred to in section 24) by exceeding, for example, the maximum permissible decibels which may be by a regulation emitted to a certain classification of land. The final disjunctive part of Rule 102--'or the Illinois Environmental Protection Act'--must be regarded as simple surplusage. It is clear that the Board's enforcement authority is limited to cases of noise that unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life or with any lawful business or activity and that the Board in its regulations could not go beyond this boundary. It would be unreasonable to say the Board sought to violate the clearly announced limitations set out in section 25 on its authority to regulate.

Another complaint of the petitioner is that the Board has violated the legislative intention in arbitrarily imposing sound-emission limitations without regard to whether such emissions in actuality would unreasonably interfere with the enjoyment of life or any lawful business or activity. That generally stated complaint is to be answered by observing that administrative action taken under statutory authority will not be set aside unless it has been clearly arbitrary, unreasonable or capricious. (Richards v. Board of Education, 21 Ill.2d 104, 171 N.E.2d 37; People ex rel. Stephens v. Collins, 35 Ill.2d 499, 221 N.E.2d 254; People ex rel. Polen v. Hoehler, 405 Ill. 322, 90 N.E.2d 729; Skokie Federal Savings and Loan Ass'n v. Savings and Loan Board, 88 Ill.App.2d 373, 232 N.E.2d 167; 1 F. Cooper, State Administrative Law 259 (1965); 2 Cooper 791.) The Board adopted its regulations only after their having been proposed by the qualified group which composed the Task Force on Noise and its consultants and only after 16 public hearings had been held by the Board extending for a period of almost a year. We cannot say that the rules which resulted from this study are clearly arbitrary, unreasonable or capricious.

The petitioner argues, too, that one of the Board's regulations, Rule 208(d) of Chapter 8 of the rules and regulations (hereafter Rule 208(d)), violates the equal protection clauses of both the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of Illinois. It also violates our constitution's prohibition of special legislation, they say, in that the regulation exempts sounds emitted by construction equipment from the operation of the regulations, while there is no exemption for identical equipment used in mining.

The legislature may create legislative classifications, for 'perfect uniformity of treatment of all persons is neither practical nor desirable.' (Grasse v. Dealer's Transport Co., 412 Ill. 179, 193, 106 N.E.2d 124, 132.) A classification must not, however, be arbitrary, and it must be based on a rational difference of condition or situation existing in the persons or objects upon which the classification rests. (...