Smoggy air could get cleaner if a new U.S. EPA standard passes muster.
Agency head Stephen Johnson has proposed lowering the allowable amount
of ground-level ozone from 80 to 84 parts per billion to 70 to 75 ppb,
since “the current standard is insufficient to protect public health.”
But the agency will hold a 90-day public-comment period on several
options, including Johnson’s plan; a recommendation from an EPA
scientific panel to make the standard even stricter; or, eh, leaving it
where it is. Fossil-fuel lobbyists and other panic-stricken people will
no doubt weigh in; said one Texas environmental official of the new
standard, “It would basically shut down our entire region, period …
the quality of life we have been able to enjoy basically goes away.”
Um. Fans of functional lungs, on the other hand, say the new standard
doesn’t go far enough: it is, says David Ingbar of the American
Thoracic Society, “unhealthy for America’s kids, unhealthy for
America’s seniors, and unhealthy for America.”

comment on the proposal: U.S. EPA proposed ground-level ozone standards