Ozone (also known as "smog")
· "Good" ozone forms the ozone layer high in the atmosphere that protects living things from harmful ultraviolet rays. "Bad" ozone forms at ground level during the summer, when volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) mix in heat and sunlight.
· In the San Joaquin Valley Air Basin, VOCs come primarily from cars, livestock waste, and gasoline-burning engines, as well as from gas stations, dry cleaners, paints, insecticides, and solvents used in degreasing operations.
· NOx are mainly produced by burning oil, coal, and gasoline. Motor vehicles, factories, and power plants are the major sources of these chemicals.
· The San Joaquin Valley is on track to become the most polluted region in the country. Ozone levels throughout much of the nation have steadily decreased, while San Joaquin Valley's levels have stagnated.
· Federal 1-hour ozone standards were exceeded 30 times in the San Joaquin Valley in 2000, compared with 33 days in the South Coast (Los Angeles) Air Basin. The Valley exceeded the tougher 8-hour ozone standards 103 times in 2000, while the South Coast registered only 94 exceedances.
· Through September 30, 2001, San Joaquin Valley has had 25 exceedance days of the federal 1-hour standard and 95 exceedance days of the 8-hour standard.
· According to a recent American Lung Association report, San Joaquin Valley is home to three of the four most ozone-polluted cities (Fresno, Bakersfield, and the Visalia-Porterville-Tulare area) in the country. All 8 counties in the Valley received an "F" grade for air quality.
· The San Joaquin Valley is home to 9 percent of California's population but accounts for 14 percent of the state's ozone pollution.
· The San Joaquin Valley has missed each of three consecutive deadlines to attain the national ozone standard, including the most recent November 15, 1999 deadline.
· EPA is past due in designating the Valley as a "severe" ozone non-attainment area, which will require the region to adopt stricter rules for new pollution sources.
· Ozone not only causes wheezing, coughing, and chest pain; prolonged inhalation of unsafe levels of ozone can reduce lung function and development, worsen asthma and allergies, and permanently damage lung tissue.
· Certain groups are disproportionately at risk, including children, the elderly, adults who work outdoors, asthmatics and people who suffer from respiratory diseases. Low-income and people of color also suffer due to lack of access to health care.
· Asthma is the leading cause of school absenteeism – nationally more than 10 million school days are missed each year due to asthma.
· In the metropolitan areas of Fresno, Modesto, Bakersfield, Salinas, and Stockton alone, the collective financial cost of asthma is more than $85 million per year.
· Nearly 12,000 people in the eight counties that make up the San Joaquin Valley Air District are hospitalized for asthma each year, more than 5,000 of whom are children.
Particulate Matter (also known as "soot")
· PM is tiny particles of dust released or kicked up into the air by cars on dirt roads, industrial grinding, construction; burning fossil fuels, garbage, and agricultural products also releases PM into the air. Secondary PM forms when chemicals react in the atmosphere. PM levels vary depending on rainfall and wind conditions.
· PM is regulated based on the size of the particles. The current standard is PM smaller than ten microns, which is about one-seventh the diameter of a human hair.
· Nationwide, air pollution causes between 50,000 and 100,000 premature deaths per year – and PM accounts for a majority of these. PM is the most deadly air pollutant, accounting for more deaths than homicides or automobile accidents.
· The San Joaquin Valley is classified as a "serious" non-attainment area for PM, the most serious designation available under the Clean Air Act.
· The San Joaquin Valley faces a deadline for attaining the national PM standards by December 31, 2001. However, the Valley has had so many violations in just the past two years that it will miss this too -- its second blown deadline since 1990.
· PM emissions have increased since 1975, and are projected to increase through 2010 in the San Joaquin Valley.
· Non-fatal effects of PM include reduced lung function and aggravation of respiratory illnesses (such as asthma, bronchitis, emphysema, chronic obstructive lung disease, and pneumonia), aggravation of allergies, and heart problems.
· Exposure to small particles of PM increases the risk of heart attacks because they are small enough to enter far into the respiratory tract and embed deep in the lung tissue.
Air pollution effects on agriculture and national parks
· Annual crop damage exceeds $150 million from air pollution.
· Smog causes trees to lose leaves, slows their growth and causes leaf damage.
· Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks have more air pollution than any national park in the west. PM clouds views in the Valley, the Sierra Nevada, and our national parks.
· 90% of trees studied at Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks show ozone damage.
· Ozone levels in the Sierra Nevada, caused by pollution in the San Joaquin Valley, are sometimes higher than Los Angeles.
Sources:
Air quality data are from California Air Resources Board http://www.arb.ca.gov/homepage.htm.
American Lung Association, State of the Air 2001, May 2001, available at www.lungusa.org
Assessment of Air Quality and Air Pollutant Impacts in Class I National Parks in California, April 2001, US Department of the Interior
Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America http://www.aafa.org/highcosts/city.html
Asthma and the Environment, President's Task Force on Environmental Health, May 2000. Report available at: http://www.epa.gov/children/whatwe/fin.pdf
California Air Resources Board, 2001 California Almanac of Emissions and Air Quality, available at www.arb.ca.gov
California County Asthma Hospitalization Chart Book, CA Department of Health Services, August 2000, available at http://www.dhs.ca.gov/ps/deodc/ehib/ehib2/topics/asthma.html
Increased Particulate Air Pollution and the Triggering of Myocardial Infarction, Peters, Annette et al (2001), Circulation, vol. 103, pp.2810-2815, available at www.circulationaha.org
The State of the Great Valley of California, The Great Valley Center, April 2001, available at http://www.greatvalley.org/research/publications/index.htm
A complete annotated bibliography of recent studies of the health effects of ozone air pollution from 1997 to 2001 is available from the American Lung Association (www.lungusa.org)
For more background:
Effects of Air Pollution on Health, Agriculture, and Forests
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