Air Quality Dramatically Improved, Agency Says

Cleaner cars, better gasoline and tougher controls on power plants all have contributed to reduce smog in Orange County dramatically over the past 10 years, environmental officials said.

Newly released figures by the federal Environmental Protection Agency show that in 1995, smog exceeded health standards in Orange County on only six days. In 1986, that number was 66.

During the same period, Los Angeles County went from 226 unhealthful days to 103, while Riverside and San Bernardino Counties went from 170 days to 110.

“It’s a significant improvement,” said David D. Schmidt, an EPA spokesman. “What it means is that Orange County went from moderately unhealthy to almost clean, while Los Angeles and Riverside/San Bernardino went from very unhealthy to moderately unhealthy.”

Orange County went from being the country’s seventh smoggiest area in 1994 to being number 27 last year. Los Angeles, historically the smoggiest city in the nation, now ranks second behind Riverside/San Bernardino.

“We’ve made great progress,” said David Howekamp, director of the EPA division that includes most of Southern California.

Howekamp attributed the dramatic improvements to a number of factors, including the increasing use of new reformulated gasoline, which does not have many of the toxic compounds found in earlier types of gas; the increasingly stringent controls on power plants and refineries; and stringent requirements that cars have periodic smog control checks.

Orange County tends to have cleaner air than other Southern California areas, he said, in part because of its proximity to the ocean, which generates breezes that blow the smog inland.

“It’s not just one thing,” Howekamp said of the steady decrease in emissions over the years. “It’s a combination of comprehensive programs that have resulted in improvements. I think it’s one of the true environmental success stories in our country.”

But Orange County and the rest of Southern California shouldn’t relax its efforts, environmental officials warned.

“The air is healthier now than it was 20 years ago,” Howekamp said, “but we’ve got a ways to go.”

Sam Atwood, a spokesman for the South Coast Air Quality Management District, which covers Orange County, agreed.

“No, we haven’t solved the smog problem in Southern California,” he said. “I can’t afford to retire yet. Essentially, we need to get those smog levels down to zero.”

The district intends to do that, he said, in a number of ways.

First, it will consider a program early next year that would impose new restrictions on activities that generate pollution caused by road dust. Among other things, Atwood said, the program would encourage street sweeping after dust storms, cause some of the area’s busiest dirt roads to be paved and enhance existing restrictions on construction projects to further reduce dust.

Other areas in need of attention, he said, are paints, solvents and vehicle emissions.

“We’re going to have to have much cleaner cars, heavy duty trucks, ships, planes and trains,” Atwood said. “We still have lots of work to do.”