EPA staff suggests tighter smog rules
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency staff said Friday that the nation should tighten smog rules significantly, a step that would improve air quality but force costly new requirements on government and industry.
The EPA staff recommendation is the final step before the rule goes to the agency’s leadership and the White House. As a result of lawsuits by environmental and health groups, the agency must propose a new ozone rule by December and the final rule by October 2015.
Federal standards for ground-level ozone, the main ingredient in smog, have proven deeply contentious because they would compel many states, cities and industries to adopt new measures to cut air pollution at a cost of billions of dollars.
California would be particularly affected since much of the state does not meet the current, weaker standard for ozone that has been in place since 2008.
Ozone is a corrosive gas that forms when pollutants from vehicle tailpipes, power plants and factories bake in sunlight. The gas irritates lungs and airways and can cause asthma attacks, premature deaths, hospital and emergency room visits and millions of missed school and work days.
Pressure has been building for years from the scientific, health and environmental communities to reduce the federal standard for ground-level ozone to between 60 and 70 parts per billion. It is currently at 75 parts per billion, a standard set by the Bush administration that fell short of a recommendation for stricter limits from the EPA’s advisory committee of independent scientists.
The EPA science advisory committee in June recommended strengthening the ozone standard to the 60-to-70-parts-per-billion range, which the agency’s staff echoed in the findings issued Friday.
The committee said “ample scientific evidence” exists that ozone is harmful at lower levels than previously thought, citing studies showing it decreased lung function and increased respiratory symptoms and airway inflammation even at concentrations of 70 parts per billion.
The recommendations are part of a review the EPA is required to complete every five years under the Clean Air Act.
The Obama administration can choose to override the recommendations and adopt a weaker standard, including the current one. Facing enormous pressure from business in 2011, President Barack Obama scuttled the EPA’s more stringent ozone rule, delaying it until after the 2012 presidential election.
But such a move today would likely trigger new litigation, said Paul Cort, a lawyer for Earthjustice, which sued the EPA to order it to issue the new standard.
California will face considerable challenges meeting a tougher ozone limit. The state has 16 areas that do not meet the current ozone standard, said Stanley Young, a spokesman for the state Air Resources Board. Lowering the standard would put even more areas out of compliance, many of them in rural areas, he said.