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| Beau Cabell/The Macon Telegraph |
| When the EPD completes monitoring Macon's air this year, the area will be a non-attainment zone, meaning its air quality fails to meet federal clean-air standards. A big reason may be traffic, like this on Riverside Drive. |
MACON'S BAD AIR
Pollution levels threatens federal transportation funding
By Jennifer Plunkett
The Macon Telegraph
M acon's air has failed to meet federal pollution standards for the past two years, threatening the loss of future federal transportation funds.
- EPA seeks to change pollution standards for cars - Activists: EPA's smog standard means fewer people will be alerted when air goes bad - Super-clean cars may be just down the road | |
EPD representatives warned local transportation officials last week that they should begin addressing the issue now, because stringent federal regulations are surely on the way.
When the EPD completes monitoring this year, it will classify Macon as a non-attainment zone, meaning the area's air is too polluted to "attain" federal clean-air standards.
Once the area receives the designation, Macon and Bibb County transportation officials will have to work hand-in-hand with the EPD to ensure road projects do not increase air pollution through greater traffic volume.
If that joint planning doesn't happen, all road projects will be blocked from receiving federal funds.
"We can take the hard-nosed stance that it ain't our fault," said Bibb County Commission chairman Larry Justice, who also chairs the Macon Area Transportation Study, a transportation planning board. "That's not going to solve the problem. We're going to have to start working with EPD. We need to try to get in there and be pro-active to see what can be done. ... But nobody has much knowledge about what this is all about - even about how Macon has been out of compliance."
Macon's air pollution was out of federal compliance for 12 days in 1997 and 18 days in 1998, according to EPD records. The EPD tests air quality from April to October, during the ozone-producing season.
Only three months were measured in 1997, leaving Ron Methier, chief of the EPD's air protection branch, to believe the non-compliance days in 1997 would have numbered higher than 12, he said.
The city with the state's worst air, Atlanta, hasn't been in compliance with federal clean-air standards since the late 1970s, and it has lost federal highway funding indefinitely for new road projects that increase traffic flow.
| OZONE POLLUTION | |
| Ground-level ozone creates smog - air pollution that settles over cities
particularly on hot, summer days. (This ozone is different from the ozone
layer in the stratosphere, which protects us from ultraviolet radiation.) | |
In Georgia, only Augusta and Macon, like metro Atlanta, fail to meet the air-quality standards. Columbus, Brunswick and Savannah currently meet or nearly meet the standards.
"We are giving (Macon) a very strong message," said Methier. "Macon is going to be non-attainment ... all indications are that, even with a very clean summer, Macon will not meet the federal clean-air standards."
By this spring, the EPD will have identified specific polluters in Macon and have compiled a breakdown of emissions from vehicles and local industry, Methier said.
The restrictions will be based on whatever is determined to be the main source of ozone-creating pollution. As an example, vehicle exhaust from Atlanta's 2.25 million cars, trucks and motor bikes in its 13-county area creates half of the city's pollution.
Macon's classification will be final in July 2000, and the EPD must submit a plan to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to control Macon's air pollution. The plan might place restrictions on new industry and on federal dollars spent on road projects.
Members of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, an environmental lobbying group, believe the plan to improve Macon's air quality should include tighter controls on old power plants - not on consumers. Power plants built before 1985 are exempt from the federal Clean Air Act.
| MEASURING AIR | |
| How air is measured at EPD's monitoring site on Riggins Mill Road: Outside air is continuously sucked inside a monitor that analyzes the air's composition with the help of a computer. The air's ozone concentration is instantaneously printed out to EPD officials in Atlanta. The monitoring takes place 24 hours a day from April to October - the time of year when the most ozone is produced. Source: EPD Air Protection Branch | |
"The city of Macon needs to be pressuring Gov. (Roy) Barnes and the Georgia congressional delegation to (end the power-plant exemption)," Giegerich said. "The easiest, most efficient way ... to address pollution is to clean up power plants."
The EPD has until 2004 to institute the air-quality-control plan.
If the EPD fails to submit a plan to the EPA by its set deadline, the EPA could impose sanctions on federal highway funds designated for Macon or on the area's transportation plans.
Federal funds also will be at risk if Macon's transportation plan - formed by MATS - doesn't comply with the EPD's air-quality plan submitted to the EPA.
That scenario was played out in Atlanta.
"We have learned a lot from Atlanta," Methier said. "We hope to avoid that happening in Macon. We need to start the process right up front."
- EPA seeks to change pollution standards for cars - Activists: EPA's smog standard means fewer people will be alerted when air goes bad - Super-clean cars may be just down the road | |
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