Following a court victory that exposed efforts to issue invalid air pollution credits to big polluters in Southern California, a coalition including NRDC has sued the South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) on August 18 over the validity of millions of credits given out since 1990. The AQMD, in charge of issuing credits to polluting facilities that demonstrate reductions in emissions or shutdowns of older facilities, has failed to provide documentation proving that reductions ever occurred before credits – often sold at below-market prices to polluters – were created. The lawsuit seeks to stop these types of credits from being issued in the future and to require AQMD to carry out a program which would offset the emissions that have been unlawfully allowed. The goal is to have pollution reduced in the same communities where it was illegally emitted. Staff Attorney Tim Grabiel is working on this case for NRDC.