The EPA is now accepting comments and will be making its final determination by March 2008. The agency's own head advances stricter rules but, nevertheless, he remains open to leaving today's rules unchanged. EPA is now in the midst of a power play between environmental associations and industry groups -- all of which led it to take a compromise position in the battle to fight the respiratory irritant.

"Based upon the current science I have concluded that the current standard is insufficient to protect public health," says EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, in a conference call. Since 1980, he says that ozone levels have dropped 21 percent nationwide as EPA, states and local governments have worked together to continue to improve the nation's air.

Ground-level ozone is not emitted directly into the air, but is created through a reaction of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compound emissions in the presence of sunlight. Emissions from industrial facilities, electric utilities, motor vehicle exhaust, gasoline vapors, and chemical solvents are the major man-made sources of these ozone precursors.

The current standard was set in 1997. At that time, the EPA estimated it would cost $9.6 billion each year and more than $100 billion overall to attain. In the aggregate and since 1970, pollution levels have dropped dramatically and have done so at a time when the nation has expanded its economy. Environmentalists say that such results are proof that green policies are win-win propositions while industry says that it is a testament to their will to do the right thing.

All agree that smog is lessening. In the past year, smog levels are estimated to have been nearly cut in half. Many factors go into those determinations. But environmentalists say that most conspicuous one is the fact that electric power plants operate under tougher rules. Nevertheless, unhealthy levels of smog were still recorded in 36 states plus the District of Columbia while Houston and San Bernardino County, Calif. recorded the worst results.

"EPA is being prudent by soliciting comments on a range of potential ozone standards, including the possibility that the current standard be left in place," says the Edison Electric Institute. "The agency needs to make sure that any additional requirements imposed on states and local communities ... will produce real public health benefits."

Cost Considerations

Environmental and public health advocates sued the EPA in 2003 to force it to write new rules. The U.S. Supreme Court subsequently ordered it to come up with a new proposal by late June 2007. If the rules are strengthened, it would mean a host of pollution control measures that range from limits on power plant emissions to new fuel standards for cars, all of which would be costlier to industry and, ultimately, to consumers.

Industry groups ranging from manufacturers to refiners all sound the same points. They say that the current standard is working as air quality continues to improve. Between 1980 and 2006, the national average for ozone levels decreased by 21 percent. Moreover, they add that the current rules will significantly reduce ground level ozone-causing emissions over the next two decades, cutting power plant emissions in half by 2015 and reducing emissions from cars and trucks by more than 70 percent by 2030.

It's not time to make changes, they say, noting that the states have not fully implemented the current rules set in 1997. EPA's focus should, instead, be on helping localities meet the law as it now stands. The objective, they add, is to bring businesses up to speed and not to put them at a competitive disadvantage.

But public health advocates say that the science is definitive and that the current ozone standards do not protect the well-being of the people. If appropriate changes are not made, they add that the elderly and those with acute breathing problems may suffer the consequences -- the aggravation of chronic lung and heart diseases.

Ozone pollution can also affect healthy children, joggers, and others who spend time outdoors on warm, sunny, but smoggy summer days. Studies from several separate research groups analyzing the available health research in the United States and Europe have found a strong link between increases in ground-level ozone and risk of premature death. Recent studies also indicate that ozone may contribute to cardiac morbidity. These health consequences have not been accounted for previously, thus the costs of not reducing ozone pollution are far higher than once believed.

"EPA has been under pressure to consider costs in support of a less protective health standard, but, as the Clean Air Act and the Supreme Court have plainly stated, EPA must set health standards based on science, not costs," says Arthur Marin, executive director of the Clean Air Association of Northeast States. "Costs come into play later when deciding how to meet the health standards established through the science."

EPA is guided by administration that insists any changes to environmental policies be prudent and not detrimental to the overall economy. But EPA is being prodded its own experts who are suggesting much tougher ozone standards. That view will likely push EPA to alter the current rules, but not enough to alienate the industrial sector.

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