A Small but Welcome Parcel

The all-enveloping nature of air pollution in the Southern California region can seem overwhelming. When the most optimistic estimates suggest that smog will remain at full choke level until at least 2007, it’s hard to believe that any single anti-smog effort can make a difference.

United Parcel Service’s announcement that it plans to start a test program in which its delivery trucks will use cleaner natural gas will not single-handedly lift the blanket of smog that engulfs the L.A. basin. The test program next year will involve only 20 of its more than 2,000 trucks.

But when the UPS decision is taken as part of a collection of anti-pollution efforts by scores of companies--and there are plenty of people in the private sector who have resolved to do something about the air we all have to breathe--it adds up to a noteworthy step toward bluer skies in an area that has the dirtiest air in the nation.

The stakes are high: Evidence is mounting that children reared in polluted areas have decreased lung capacity, compared to those raised in areas with cleaner air.

Natural gas burns cleaner and cheaper than gasoline, so city and air quality officials naturally welcome its use. As more companies consider the use of natural gas, it’s also important for business to advance the appropriate engine technology to maximize the benefit of using a clean fuel. If an engine that was built to use gasoline uses natural gas, some harmful emissions may decrease, but others may increase. UPS is but a part of a larger research effort to link the right engine technology and alternative fuel.

This won’t be easy to achieve, but it is well worth doing. And, overall, the UPS program is another reminder of the crucial role to be played by private industry in the use of alternative fuels, be they natural gas, propane or others.

And it is testimony to the influence of the Air Quality Management District, whose prodding in the last few years has gently--and sometimes not so gently--pushed industry to consider more than work schedules when it puts its trucks on the road.

A small step perhaps, but no small credit all around.