Air pollution has been solved as a long-term problem by already-adopted measures that will eliminate most remaining pollution from automobiles and industry in coming years, according to a new report released by the John Locke Foundation.
According to Joel Schwartz, author of “Clearing the Air in North Carolina: Pollution Myths and Realities,” the recently raised federal ozone standard is the only remaining air pollution challenge facing the state, which meets the Environmental Protection Agency’s standards for carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and “coarse” airborne particulates (PM10). Most (95 percent) of the state’s monitors comply with the EPA’s fine particulate standards (PM2.5), as well as the agency’s previous ozone standard.
The EPA raised the standards for ozone, in April, nudging the state out of compliance for those pollutants. The implications for the state can be costly, Schwartz said.
“Policymakers and business leaders worry whether the state can meet the new federal requirements and avoid imposed limits on economic development and loss of federal transportation funds,” he wrote.
In his report, Schwartz criticized traditional approaches to reducing pollution like measures to reduce driving automobiles and “command-and-control” regulations on industrial emissions. He said the reductions achieved in recent years through technological advancements and Clean Air Act provisions mean “that population and transportation growth will have little effect on future air-quality improvements.”
Instead, Schwartz said North Carolina can speed progress toward attainment of the new ozone standard by adopting other measures at lesser costs than most current proposals. He said perhaps the “greatest untapped opportunity” is “gross-polluting,” or older, automobiles.
“The worst 5 percent of cars produce half of all ozone-forming volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions,” he wrote.
Schwartz recommended financial incentives for owners of older vehicles to repair or scrap them in favor of new cars. “An aggressive program could reduce automobile VOC emissions by 30 to 40 percent within a year or two,” he said.
Schwartz also condemned solutions, such as rail transit, recommended by “regulators and activists” that are costly and have almost no effect on emissions. Two of those activist groups, the American Lung Association and the Public Interest Research Group, were the targets of much of Schwartz’s myth-debunking.
For example, Schwartz said the ALA uses much more stringent standards then the EPA when grading air quality, and then often issues unnecessarily alarmist reports.
“All of North Carolina complies with the 24-hour PM2.5 standard by a large margin,” Schwartz wrote, “yet ALA gave an ‘A’ to only a few counties and failed three.”
Schwartz’s full report can be viewed on the Internet at www.johnlocke.org. Carolina Journal is published by the John Locke Foundation.