Cleaner Air in the Balance
EPA Opens Door to Stricter Ozone Standards
(February 1, 2010)—
Will 2010 be the year when we take a quantum leap towards healthier air? The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing to lower the nation's official limit on the amount of ozone considered safe to breathe, called the national ambient air quality standard. Ozone, often known as smog, is one of the most dangerous gases polluting our communities—and the most widespread. The American Lung Association has fought hard to get EPA to provide better protection from ozone. Now is the time to tell them that we need less smog in the U.S.
Lung Association volunteers are testifying at public hearings February 2nd and 4th to tell EPA about the need for a stronger ozone standard. You can send comments to EPA directly if you can't make the hearings. The deadline for all comments is March 22, 2010. EPA will announce their decision on the standard by August 31, 2010. For more information on the hearings, click here. Can't make one of the public hearings? We still want your voice heard! Send EPA a comment! Click here to learn more.
Ozone – A Public Health Threat
The Lung Association has long urged EPA to provide more protection from ozone with a stronger national air quality standard. Overwhelming scientific evidence shows that our nation needs a stronger ozone standard to protect your health.
"Ozone actually burns the airways and lungs, causing inflammation," said Dr. Norman H. Edelman, chief medical officer of the American Lung Association. "In healthy people, this inflammation can cause difficulty breathing, coughing, wheezing and chest pain."
"People with respiratory problems, such as asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are at greater risk because they can't handle the burden of additional inflammation in their already inflamed lungs," Edelman said. "For them, exposure to too much ozone can mean a trip to the hospital and can even be life threatening. People with heart disease are also at increased risk of dying from breathing ozone"
EPA Must Protect Millions
Nearly two years ago, EPA ignored the recommendations of their own scientists and selected a standard for ozone that was too weak—allowing far more pollution than compelling research said was safe. The Clean Air Act requires EPA to set the health-based national air quality standard to protect the millions of people who live where ozone smog sends children to the emergency room and shortens the lives of people with chronic lung disease.
When the EPA failed to set the standard where it will protect public health the Lung Association and our colleagues immediately took legal action to require EPA to reconsider their decision. As a result, EPA has agreed to take another look. The EPA's own independent science advisors had repeatedly emphasized the need for a stronger standard than the one adopted in 2008. EPA has now proposed setting the new standard in the range that their advisors had long recommended.
Working for a Healthier Ozone Limit
"Millions of children, older adults and people with chronic lung diseases need EPA to defend them," said Charles D. Conner, American Lung Association President and CEO. "We urge EPA to set the final standard where it provides the greatest safeguards to the most people."
In the coming months, EPA will make its decision. The American Lung Association will be at all three public hearings and work throughout the coming months to urge adoption of an ozone standard that follows the science and the law. The final ozone smog standard is too critical to the health of millions to do otherwise.
"This is the kind of change that can easily fly under the public radar, but it will have a huge impact on the quality of the air we breathe for the next decade and beyond," said Janice Nolen, the Lung Association's Assistant Vice President of National Policy and Advocacy. "We need to seize this opportunity and let the EPA know that lives will be improved and saved if they make the right decision."
You can help fight for healthier air! Tell EPA you want safer ozone limits. Learn more…
Related links
