EPA Smog Plan Doesn’t Satisfy Industry or Activists
By Traci Watson
Environmental groups and industry groups reacted coolly Thursday, though for different reasons, to a proposal to cut the level of smog allowed in the USA’s air.
The Environmental Protection Agency announced a plan to reduce the smog limit by 11% to 17%. It left open the possibility that the final smog limit could be stricter than what it proposed or not changed at all. The EPA asked for public comment on limits for 90 days. A final standard should be reached by March 2008.
Environmentalists were disappointed and protested the proposal’s suggestion that the EPA might retain the current limit rather than setting a tighter one.
“That’s an outrageous idea, driven by politics instead of science,” said Frank O’Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, an environmental group.
Industry groups were disappointed that the EPA even proposed to tighten the smog limit. They noted many communities haven’t met the current limit of 84 parts of smog per billion parts of air, set in 1997.
The EPA says 104 counties, mostly in California and the Northeast, have smog levels that don’t meet current limits. If the EPA proposal becomes final, 533 counties would violate smog levels. There are more than 3,100 counties in the USA.
“Even though a lot has been done and spent, there is still a long way to go to meeting the current standard,” said John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers. “Therefore, we see no reason to revise the current standard.”
The EPA allows communities leeway in how to meet smog limits. To reach the current standard, communities have proposed measures such as limiting emissions from factories and adding pollution controls to diesel trucks. They could adopt similar steps to meet a more stringent limit.
Smog forms from pollutants released by factories, cars and coal-burning power plants. Sunlight powers the chemical reactions that create smog, which is why smog is usually worst in the summer.
Scientific studies have tied higher smog levels to higher numbers of emergency-room visits and hospital admissions, according to the EPA. Breathing smog exacerbates asthma and raises the risk of death, the agency said.
EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson emphasized that by his reading of the science, the current limit does not protect public health. “I do not believe that there is scientific justification for retaining the current standard,” Johnson said Thursday. “I recognize that others don’t agree with that, and so I want to provide an opportunity … to provide comments.”
Johnson’s final ruling, due in March, will probably attract criticism no matter what he decides.
An independent scientific panel that advises the EPA unanimously recommended last year that the smog limit be tightened more than what was proposed Thursday.
Representatives of the auto, chemical and other industries have visited the White House in the past month to make their case, according to the Office of Management and Budget.
“It’s clear the administrator is facing a lot of pressure on both sides,” said Jeffrey Holmstead, the former EPA chief of air pollution, now an attorney at Bracewell & Giuliani. “They’ve tried to stake out something in the middle.” (c) Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.