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Air Apparent
With state’s air choked with smog, environmental group call for tougher auto emissions standards
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Business New Haven
9/01/2003
By: Michael C. Bingham
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With air-quality forecasters expecting at press time to issue a Connecticut "smog alert" for the third consecutive day August 21, the Connecticut Clean Cars Alliance, a coalition of public health and environmental organizations led by the Connecticut Fund for the Environment and the Connecticut Public Interest Research Group (ConnPIRG), has called on state leaders to adopt Clean Car standards to reduce tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks.
First established by California, these emissions standards have since been adopted by New York, Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) characterizes air quality as unhealthy when it contains elevated concentrations of ground-level ozone, or smog.
Vehicles emit the majority of smog-forming emissions in Connecticut. These emissions trigger asthma attacks, aggravate lung and heart disease and exacerbate the state’s chronic air quality problem.
A bill to adopt the "clean cars" standards was introduced in the legislature during 2003 and will be reintroduced in the 2004 legislative session. The Connecticut Clean Cars Alliance says it will call for passage of the bill during the 2004 legislative session.
The standards would reduce allowable emissions from new cars sold in the state beginning in 2007 and require that automakers offer more advanced-technology clean cars for sale to Connecticut consumers.
"Car manufacturers already have the technology to meet and exceed stricter emission standards, reduce pollution and cut global warming pollutants without affecting vehicle size, safety or performance," explains Don Strait, executive director of the Connecticut Fund for the Environment (CFE).
A report to be released by ConnPIRG in coming weeks will detail Connecticut’s chronic air pollution. The report analyzes the incidence of unhealthy "smog days" in Connecticut during 2002 and 2003.
"Connecticut’s residents routinely breathe unhealthy air," says ConnPIRG’s Christopher Phelps. "Cars and trucks emit the lion’s share of the pollution in our air. Clean car standards are needed to ensure unhealthy air does not remain a routine part of life in our communities."
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