Published: March 13, 2008 11:23 pm            

Boyd, Greenup barely miss new EPA regulations

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ASHLAND — Boyd and Greenup counties narrowly missed meeting new Environmental Protection Agency ozone standards released this week, state officials said Thursday.

Boyd and Greenup counties are among the 345 nationwide whose air does not meet the new ozone standards, out of more than 700 counties monitored by the EPA.

The agency announced Wednesday it was tightening its restrictions on the amount of ozone, more commonly known as smog, that it will allow in air. The new standard lowers the concentration of ozone allowed from 80 parts per billion to 75 parts per billion.

Lona Brewer, manager of program planning for division for air quality within Kentucky’s Environmental and Public Protection Cabinet, said Boyd and Greenup counties measured a concentration of 76 parts per billion of ozone in the air, according to EPA monitoring data collected from 2004 to 2006.

Although Boyd and Greenup do not meet the new standard as it was applied Wednesday, they have not yet been classified by the EPA as nonattainment areas. That determination will follow two more years of air monitoring, Brewer said.

“The EPA released that standard yesterday (Wednesday). What people don’t understand is the designations for people that are meeting or aren’t meeting that standard won’t come out until March 2010,” she said speaking by phone from Frankfort on Thursday.

She added state environmental officials will then have three years to determine a plan of action to bring nonattaining areas back into compliance and several more to implement the plan.

Brewer said there is a chance both counties will be within the standards by the end of the next two-year monitoring period and remain in compliance with EPA rules — something both counties have been diligently working toward.

In addition to the revised ozone standard, new more stringent federal restrictions on emissions from a variety of sources — ranging from large power plants to automobiles — are also scheduled to be put into place this year by the EPA.

“You’re looking at a substantial amount of emissions reductions that are already scheduled to be put in place,” Brewer said. “We have no way of knowing of whether those will be enough to bring us back into compliance.”

Brewer stressed that despite failing to meet the newly established standards, big improvements have been made in Boyd and Greenup counties in recent years.

“Air quality is improving, it’s not that some area is sliding back,” she said. “Progress has been made, that is one of the most important things we need to let people know. Air quality is improving but based on the latest data available from the EPA they believe this new standard would be more protective of human health.”

In July 2006, a portion of Boyd County that had been on the EPA’s nonattainment list for sulfur dioxide since 1978 was removed and last summer it was removed from the EPA’s nonattainment list for eight-hour ozone standards.

Boyd County remains on the EPA’s list for fine particle standards nonattainment, where it has been since 2005.

The EPA has said, based on various studies, cutting smog from 80 to 75 parts per billion would prevent between 900 and 1,100 premature deaths a year, 1,400 fewer nonfatal heart attacks and 5,600 fewer hospital or emergency room visits. Compliance with the new standards will cost between $7.6 and $8.5 billion per year but could yield health benefits valued between $2 billion and $19 billion, according to the EPA.

The EPA’s decision to lower the ozone standard was met with sharp criticism from both sides. Health experts accuse the agency of ignoring the science, saying the new standards still fall short of what is needed to significantly reduce heart and asthma attacks from breaking smog-clogged air.

Electric utilities, the oil and chemical industries and manufacturing groups, which have waged intense lobbying campaigns in Washington, D.C., in recent weeks, argue the new restrictions will require new pollution controls that will harm economic growth.

CARRIE KIRSCHNER can be reached at ckirschner@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2653.

        

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