g (example: 6 hours of bicycling). These changes in lung function are often so small that they are within a person’s normal daily variation.
- Epidemiology studies show an association between a person’s likelihood of dying, and the outdoor concentrations of ozone in the days before (or the day of) a person’s death. However, we spend most of our time indoors (particularly people who are near death), so the people in the studies were exposed to levels of ozone that are far below those that cause any clinical effect.
Problems with Implementing a New Ozone Standard:
- Some places in the U.S. have background levels of ozone that account for up to 80 percent of total ozone. Background ozone occurs naturally, or is transported from other countries. The EPA does not take this into account when making the rule.
- Ozone is not produced directly, but instead forms when other chemicals (particularly nitrogen oxides) react with sunlight. However, ozone chemistry is complicated, and the same nitrogen oxides that produce ozone can also react with existing ozone to remove it from the air. So places that have high nitrogen oxide production (such as areas near roads), often have lower ozone levels.
- Because ozone chemistry is complex, lowering ozone-producing chemicals in the cities would decrease ozone in the suburbs, but could increase ozone in the inner-cities (because there will be a decrease in the nitrogen oxides that can remove ozone). This means that, according to EPA predictions, those living in the inner cities could bear more health burdens, while people on the outskirts enjoy the predicted benefits.
Proponents of lower ozone standards sometimes advance the argument that even if the lower standards are not scientifically justified, what is it going to hurt to have cleaner air? The answer is, why regulate something that is not really going to have a benefit? That effort should be put into regulating something that will have a benefit—perhaps air toxics—perhaps figuring out what is causing increased reported rates of asthma—perhaps looking at indoor air quality, which probably has a bigger impact on health than outdoor air quality, because data shows Americans likely spend at least 90 percent of their time indoors.
There are costs to regulation. Increased regulatory costs make nearly all goods and services more expensive, particularly energy. There is a real, human cost resulting from higher energy bills, especially in Texas. For poor Texans (and many poor Texans are elderly Texans), being able to keep their home cool on hot and humid summer days has a real health benefit.
If an area violates an ozone standard, it is in nonattainment, and new regulations are imposed, with the goal of bringing those areas into attainment. Those regulations and the expenses they impose make it more difficult and more expensive for many existing businesses and industries to operate, and those costs are eventually passed on to the consumer.
Being in nonattainment also means that new businesses that produce qualifying emissions may have to purchase emissions offsets to open their doors, or consider opening their business in another area that is in attainment.
If the EPA decides the new ozone standards should be at the lower end of the range, close to 60 ppb, it is likely that areas like El Paso; San Antonio; Victoria; the Tyler region in East Texas; the I-H 35 corridor between San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth, including Austin and Waco; Beaumont and Port Arthur; parts of the Panhandle and Rio Grande Valley; and Big Bend National Park would be in nonattainment.
For the DFW and Houston-Galveston-Brazoria areas, which are already in nonattainment, and already heavily regulated, reaching attainment would become even more difficult and further impact economic growth. All residents of these areas would be affected.
A study commissioned by the National Association of Manufacturers found that, in a scenario where new ozone standards constrained natural gas production, electricity prices could increase by 15 percent for residential customers and 23 percent f