This move comes at a cost of about $1.9 million each year to businesses, The Los Angeles Times reports.
Business groups in Southern California have complained about the new rules in which as many as 90 facilities across the region would be affected. The new expenses will come in the form of new health studies, notification requirements, and pollution controls, the South Coast air district said, per the Los Angeles Times.
The new regulations will affect scores of facilities in Southern California, including oil refineries, aerospace plants, and metal factories and will require them to reduce toxic emissions or notify their neighbors regarding the health risks from these operations under these rules which were approved on Friday by air quality officials.
The regulations adopted by the South Coast Air Quality Management District governing board follows new guidelines recommended by state environmental officials that estimate the cancer risk from toxic air contaminants is nearly three times greater than what experts originally thought, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Environmentalists support the new regulations.
“We need the government to update their regulations to better protect our communities, families and children,” Adrian Martinez, a lawyer for the environmental nonprofit organization Earthjustice.
As it stands now, the air district’s rules cover about 400 facilities across Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, and these facilities emit pollutants such as arsenic, benzene, and toxic metals. This means that surrounding residents are at greater risk of cancer and other health problems. These facilities have been monitored for the past 25 years under California’s Air Toxics Hot Spots Program.
If the cancer risk at one of these facilities exceeds 10 in one million, the operator is required to alert neighbors and hold public meetings, the Los Angeles Times reports. If the risk reaches 25 in one million the facility is required to take steps to lower emissions–a level of 25 in one million means that air pollution from the facility may result in 25 cancer cases per every one million people over a 30-year period.
Under these regulations, around 87 of those 400 facilities will need to complete additional health-risk assessments, 42 will be required to issue public notifications and 22 may have to reduce cancer risks by cutting emissions, the air district estimates.
How is air pollution measured?
Air pollution can be measured directly as it is emitted by a source, in terms of mass/volume of emission (e.g., grams/m3) or through mass/process parameter (e.g.grams/kg fuel consumed or grams/second), Cleanairworld reports. It can also be measured in the atmosphere in the form of a concentration (e.g., micrograms/m3). Ambient air monitoring data is used to determine air quality, establish the severity of air pollution problems, assess whether the standards are being met, and characterize the possible human health risk in an area.
Southland business groups have asked the air district to loosen the requirements and reduce the burden on companies, saying that the rules will force businesses to warn communities that health risks from their operations are rising even if their facility’s emissions have stayed the same or dropped.
In a letter earlier this year, the Los Angeles County Business Federation pressured the air district to “avoid unnecessarily alarming the public while harming local businesses and our economy.” Only a few businesses present at the air district’s public hearing last Friday criticized the proposal, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Recently revised air toxics guidelines issued by the state resulted from scientific studies over the last decade. The studies showed that young children and infants are more sensitive to toxic air pollutants than was previously thought. Earlier estimates were based on adults and didn’t take into account how breathing the same pollutants in early childhood might elevate the risk of developing cancer later in life.
Some 30 other pollution-control districts in California are also making changes to existing air toxics rules in order to implement the new health-risk guidelines. Statewide, several hundred facilities could face additional pollution-control and notification requirements, the Air Resources Board reports.
A report issued last October stated that the cancer risk from air pollution has dropped by 65 percent since 2005, but is still too high in several areas, regional air quality directors stated, the Los Angeles Times reports here.
It’s thought that the improvement is largely due to tougher state and local regulations, incentive programs, and cleaner fuels that have slashed diesel emissions from trucks, ships, and other vehicles traveling on freeways and along freight corridors and ports.
Even though progress has been made, Southern Californians still have to deal with the highest cancer risk from air pollution in the state. The worst levels are in communities near industrial zones, rail yards, ports, freeways and other corridors where freight is transported.
These new regulations also extend to businesses seeking new permits from the South Coast air district, the Los Angeles Times reports. Around 28 of these facilities will have to cut emissions each year, air district officials said.
Gas stations and spray booths–which are used at auto body shops and other small businesses, are exempt for the time being. The air district is allowing them to operate under current guidelines in order to give them more time to install new pollution controls, the Los Angeles Times reports.
