Stricter Smog Check Plan Off to a Sputtering Start
Southern California motorists have been paying extra fees for an enhanced smog check program that exists mostly on paper and has yet to do anything to scrub the brown haze from the air.
Smog Check II was designed to clean up oxides of nitrogen, the chemical from car emissions that turns smog brown, burns the lungs and obscures the peaks of the San Gabriel Mountains even on some sunny days.
But after nearly nine months of delays, the program still isn’t off the ground--a victim of technical and political problems.
The thousands of mom-and-pop automotive shops that were forced to buy expensive equipment in order to participate have had to raise test fees to help cover costs. In recent months, the price of a smog check in Southern California has risen from an average of $30 to more than $50.
Even when the state finally ordered stations to use the new equipment in June, it decided that cars would be failed only for high emissions of carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons--not for emitting the oxides of nitrogen the new program was designed to target.
“What we have now is a smog check program that we all get to pay for but doesn’t reduce much smog. It’s really incredibly absurd,” said Sen. Steve Peace (D-El Cajon), the program’s most outspoken critic.
To Peace, the delays demonstrate a reluctance by the Wilson administration to put into effect a program that may boomerang with consumers as more and more cars fail smog tests and are required to undergo costly repairs.
But officials at the Bureau of Automotive Repair, which oversees smog checks, insist that delays were unavoidable. They blame a failure by manufacturers to deliver and install the new equipment on time and the need for a shakedown period to allow technicians to get familiar with the new program.
K. Martin Keller, chief of the bureau, acknowledged that the state’s approach has been to go slow. He said consumers and the repair industry need time to adjust to what is a major transformation in the smog check industry.
Smog Check II is “a significant change in habit as well as skill,” he said, “and to overwhelm the system with failing as many cars as possible at the very beginning would be to kill it . . . . I just can’t see how any politician would ding us for not being careful on that.”
He said he hopes testing for oxides of nitrogen will begin by the end of this month, but added that there will be a phase-in when initial failure points are so high that only the most heavily polluting vehicles will flunk. “We need to move slowly here. . . . “Let’s not do it all in the first day.”
Balancing Acceptance and Requirements
The winding route of Smog Check II illustrates the politically treacherous nature of a program that must balance the noble goal of cleaning the air against the cost and inconvenience it imposes on the public. Studies show that although the public wholeheartedly endorses clean air, it chafes at the requirements for testing and repairing cars.
“People just don’t necessarily see it [smog check] as having a direct benefit for them,” said Elizabeth Deakin, professor of transportation policy at UC Berkeley.
Controversial from its inception, Smog Check II was California’s answer to 1990 amendments to the federal Clean Air Act requiring the smoggiest areas of the country to reduce automobile emissions. With the most cars and the worst air quality in the nation, the state was forced to comply or lose $500 million in federal highway funds.
A public-private partnership, Smog Check II expanded on the smog inspection system the state has had in effect since 1984 by mandating tough new emissions tests for areas that couldn’t meet air quality standards--primarily Los Angeles and Orange counties and portions of San Diego, Ventura, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. The only large areas outside of Southern California targeted for Smog Check II--which was supposed to start Dec. 1, 1997--were urban sections of Sacramento County.
Cars in Smog Check II areas were to be tested on a complex machine called a dynamometer--a treadmill-like device that simulates driving conditions. As with previous smog tests, the machine would measure hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide; more important, it would also now check oxides of nitrogen emissions.
Cars failing the test would have to undergo repairs and further testing, a process designed to ultimately reduce emissions by 110 tons of pollutants a day and meet the federal Environmental Protection Agency requirements.
For the rest of the state, smog tests would be conducted as they have been for years. Rural areas with the cleanest air would not be required to have regular smog inspections. In other areas, a test would be required every two years but only for carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons.
A spokesman for the EPA said the federal government is watching California’s progress, but until an evaluation is completed it is too soon to determine whether it is meeting requirements.
Critics are skeptical about whether, when Smog Check II does finally get underway, it can win acceptance with the public or meet EPA requirements. They worry that it may have been crippled by legislative tinkering and inherent problems. For example:
* In 1997, the Legislature exempted cars from 1973 and earlier, as well as all cars four years old or less, from having to get smog checks. The exemptions reduced the number of vehicles needing smog checks by about 30%. The Inspection and Maintenance Review Committee, an independent group appointed to evaluate the Smog Check program, warned that many of the older cars were likely to be the most serious polluters.
* When Smog Check II goes into effect, consumers will face a confusing array of smog check stations, including test-only sites, test and repair stations, gross polluter certification pilot stations and gold shield repair stations (which guarantee their emission repairs). “The root problems with the program are the requirement to have so many darn different kinds of testing facilities,” said Christopher Walker, a lobbyist for the California Service Station and Automotive Repair Assn. “It’s absolutely ludicrous.”
* State officials acknowledge that they are also worried about whether automotive stations have the expertise to perform the repairs needed to reduce oxides of nitrogen emissions. “We have an industry out there that has never repaired cars for [oxides of nitrogen and] . . . the industry needs to learn how to do these repairs,” Keller said.
But industry representatives say all the repair stations need is to have the program get underway so they can demonstrate their prowess.
“Turn it on. . . . These people are aching for repairs,” Walker said. “Give us a break. Let us fix the cars. That’s what we do for a living.”
Tom Riley, a lobbyist for the Automotive Service Councils of California, said that to buy the new dynamometers, many of his members took out loans, some even second mortgages, only to find out that it would be months before the tougher testing system would generate additional repairs and revenue.
“Our guys are just being massacred. I’ve never seen anything like this where a small business has stepped up to the plate and government has utterly turned a blind eye to them,” Riley said.
Worst Polluters May Be Exempt
In Costa Mesa, Nick Papageorges, owner of Grimm Performance, said he’s concerned that the exemptions from Smog Check II will protect the biggest polluters. Legislators exempted older vehicles with classic cars in mind, he said, but “they forgot about the old beaters . . . that have not been kept up. For every classic car, I can find you five old clunkers.”
The EPA spokesman said his agency is concerned that the exemptions may cause California to fall short of its emission projections.
Environmentalists, who have been strong supporters of Smog Check II, share his worries. Tim Carmichael, policy director for the Santa Monica-based Coalition for Clean Air, said both the delays in starting the program and the exemptions have jeopardized a potentially powerful tool for cleaning the air.
“Automobiles are still the No. 1 source of pollution in California,” he said. “And Smog Check II is one of the few programs that delivers a pollution reduction in the very near term. We can’t just let it slip away.”
Keller rebuffs the critics, saying there are already hints that the program will win acceptance. He said 3,400 repair stations agreed to invest in the new equipment, a sign not only that there will be plenty of competition to keep prices down, but also that the private sector is behind the new program.
And even with the rising costs of smog checks, he said he has received few complaints from consumers or their legislative representatives.
“I’m actually confident that we can come in ahead of schedule,” he said, “because I think we’re going to get a lot more emissions than people think we’re going to.”
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Higher Fees, Same Smog
Some Southern California motorists have been paying extra fees for an enhanced smog check program that still isn’t fully implemented. And critics question its ability to actually improve the air. The program, known as Smog Check II, divides the state into three areas. The most heavily polluted areas will eventually receive advanced testing and are subject to the higher fees. The rest of the state will take a less restrictive test or won’t be required to test.
Smog check II areas
Less restrictive test
No regular smog checks
Source: California Bureau of Automotive Repair
