State sees more work, health gains under EPA ozone plan
A new tightening of national ozone standards could mean more work and expense for Delaware, but also increased public health and environmental benefits from an air quality campaign that already has made huge strides, a top state official said Wednesday.
The Environmental Protection Agency proposal –the third major change since the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 – recommends reducing the nation’s air quality standard for ozone from an average 75 parts per billion over an eight-hour period to a still-to-be-determined 65 ppb to 70 ppb level. Study will continue on a move to 60 ppb as well.
Ozone, one of the ingredients of urban smog, is an irritating oxygen molecule formed when pollutants from traffic, industries and other human activities cook in the air during hot, sunny, windless days. It can be a particular problem for the elderly, the very young and those with asthma or other respiratory problems.
Billions of dollars have been spent nationwide since Congress approved a push for compliance with what was then a looser, 125 ppb hourly limit for ozone. Delaware and other states took actions ranging from imposing new limits on industrial and motor vehicle tailpipe emissions to increased spending on transit and requirements for cuts in vapor releases from gasoline pumps and paints.
“I think we need to know what the final target is we’re shooting for,” said Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control Secretary David Small. “Generally, it’s going to mean more work. We’ve done the easy things.”
“I think one thing people need to remember is, while we are investing in pollution controls, however that translates, for all of those investments, there are dollars that are returned to us in the form of health benefits.”
The EPA estimated that a 70 ppb standard would cost the nation about $3.9 billion and a 65 ppb standard some $15 billion. But the value of avoided asthma attacks, illnesses, lost productivity and other health benefits would prove three times greater, from as much as $13 billion for the lower standard and $38 billion for a 65 ppb target.
Industry groups and some members of Congress immediately released critical and cautionary statements. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said a written response that the EPA plan could cost families and average $1,500, and would “cost our economy millions of jobs.”
Scott H. Segal, an environmental policy expert with Bracewell & Giuliani, an international law firm with a practice that includes government relations, energy and regulatory issues, said in a written comment that the proposal could impose “real, practical limitations” on the nation’s energy production.
Proposed targets are near natural background levels in some parts of the country, he said, and would provide “little real benefit,” particularly in light of costs and comparable returns from other health initiatives.
Small said that Delaware’s compliance will rely heavily on control of pollutants drifting across state borders. Although traffic emissions are now the state’s largest internal contributor to ozone problems, a large share also is caused by emissions from power plants in other states.
Former DNREC secretary Collin P. O’Mara, now president of the National Wildlife Federation, said that a toughened standard and control of interstate pollution drift “give us the potential to have health air in all parts of Delaware by the end of the decade.”
“When you look at the impact of air quality on bird populations or other wildlife and also the deposition of pollution onto waterways, the ecological benefits of this rule can’t be overstated,” O’Mara said.
Public hearings and a 90-day federal comment period are planned.
Contact Jeff Montgomery at 463-3344 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com.