Houston: Just say 'yes' to clean air

[Double L]

Dec. 2, 2006, 11:03PM

Breathtaking idea

Houston: Just say 'yes' to clean air

The EPA should decline all requests to extend compliance deadlines here

By VICTOR B. FLATT

Last week the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality announced that the Houston-Galveston-Brazoria region will not comply with the Clean Air Act's requirement to eliminate unhealthy levels of ozone by 2010, ensuring that the state will ask the EPA for an extension of time until 2018 to reach attainment. The EPA should just say "No!"

[Edited by Editor. Do not post entire newspaper articles. It is a violation of copyright law and the terms of service you agreed to when you signed up with HAIF.]

http://chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/...ok/4375349.html

[TheNiche]

Except late homework doesn't kill people; ozone pollution does.

Prove it, please. Cite sources where applicable. Thank you.

[DJ V Lawrence]

Prove it, please. Cite sources where applicable. Thank you.

What about asthma? I'm sure air pollution doesn't help any.

[nmainguy]

Prove it, please. Cite sources where applicable. Thank you.

You ask to compare the dangers of homework vs. ozone? No one needs to prove it. To even ask is intellectually lazy not to mention dishonest.

[Double L]

Well the EPA guidelines stated the o-zone was at "unhealthy" levels for Houston in the article. There are pollutants in the Houston area which greatly increase the risk of asthma such as nitrogen oxides and volatile organic chemicals. Chemicals which are ussually in the earths upper atmosphere are more harmful lower down and can irritate respiratory problems and asthma. For residents in these neighborhoods of Houston this health risk is a consistent safety issue harming their life expectancy and causing multiple health problems.

The TCEQ is saying that we will not have to reduce these emmissions if we compensate with auto emmission reductions. That is not unrealistic but it is risky in that we might not be able to achieve it. However with such health risks for our residents in place we should simply reduce both because safety is more important than the economy. Our laws will be as high as the federal standards so when looking at the economy we will match other U.S. cities in competition. The article says that the only other city below standards is LA.

My proposal is that we get our strict laws in place against these pollutants and then also that we form a Texas Regional Transportation Authority like the one in Georgia to reduce pollutants caused by transportation.

[TheNiche]

You ask to compare the dangers of homework vs. ozone? No one needs to prove it. To even ask is intellectually lazy not to mention dishonest.

You misunderstand, as usual. Prove to me that ozone in the form of air pollution kills people.

And btw, to NOT ask something is intellectually 'lazy'. Words that I think you might find more useful in your petty attempts to berate me would be 'hyperactive' or 'obsessive'. As for dishonest, well I just don't know where you came up with that one.

[TheNiche]

Well the EPA guidelines stated the o-zone was at "unhealthy" levels for Houston in the article. There are pollutants in the Houston area which greatly increase the risk of asthma such as nitrogen oxides and volatile organic chemicals. Chemicals which are ussually in the earths upper atmosphere are more harmful lower down and can irritate respiratory problems and asthma. For residents in these neighborhoods of Houston this health risk is a consistent safety issue harming their life expectancy and causing multiple health problems.

I'm not really addressing the effect of nitrogen oxides or volatile organic chemicals. Those are different kinds of pollution. I'm asking specifically about ozone, as that was the focus of the article. If you can demonstrate to me that even a single individual has been killed by atmospheric ozone inhalation, I'll be satisfied. Otherwise, I want the source of the study that concluded that ozone as atmospheric pollution kills people, and I'd also like estimates of the number of people that it kills.

However with such health risks for our residents in place we should simply reduce both because safety is more important than the economy. Our laws will be as high as the federal standards so when looking at the economy we will match other U.S. cities in competition. The article says that the only other city below standards is LA.

My proposal is that we get our strict laws in place against these pollutants and then also that we form a Texas Regional Transportation Authority like the one in Georgia to reduce pollutants caused by transportation.

Safety is a component of the economy, not a competing issue. People really need to grasp that they live in an unsafe world. There are reasonable things that can be done to try to curb the risk, but there is a limit to what can and should be done. Take auto accidents, for example. They kill something like 40,000 people per year in this country and account for a huge chunk of our accidental death rate. Does that mean that we should phase out all forms of automobile transportation in the interest of peoples' safety? Sure, there are some extremist nutjobs out there that would say yes. I'm not among them. I realize that without trucks, for example, the transport costs for goods and services would increase to very high levels, get passed on to the consumer, and result in a lot more poor people in our society. Poor people practice poor nutrition, which results in far more health problems than ozone ever has or ever will.

This brings up another point. We only have so many resources with which to do anything at all. Even if safety is deemed to be the utmost priority, there are so many ways in which people can die that resources would have to be rationed off between competing threats. Again, ozone is probably pretty low on that list. I think that the eradication of staircases and the implementation of an elevator society would be one of the first things to occur. Falls account for an enormous number of fatal accidents per year, after all. And then, of course, there are the big ones: heart disease, heart attacks, etc. Shouldn't they get a lot more attention? Where's ozone on your list?

These are the reasons why I can effectively make the argument that the expenditure of billions of dollars to reduce ozone levels on the grounds that it will result in fewer and less severe cases of asthma and respiratory irritation is not worth it. What we need to ensure, very simply, is that residents are aware of the risk so that they can make decisions that maximize their own well-being and that of their families. Information is sometimes the best cure for a malady.

[Double L]

Alright fine, there is all sorts of risks to people's health, some of which we can't control, but if we can control it, why don't we?

Public safety is of our highest priority. We cannot risk sacrificing a human beings health for money or our job creation. Job creation is not as important as a human lung. Also, about the money spent by private companies. We are raising our level to the federal standards. That is a nationwide standard. That is of the most basic standard. So therefore this is the most basic health standard of air quality for an American citizen. Why can't a private company put its money where it will respect the health of people living nearby internal combustion engine polluters. There are emission control techniques that can be done. I'm assuming we haven't done them yet, we just need to start. I just don't see why we don't put our efforts into both auto emissions and polluting buildings. We require that level of effort for our citizens.

Now what you are ignoring which is the most important thing is that right now there are thousands of Houstonians living in these conditions and the air quality is effecting their quality of health and shortening their lifespan.

The pollutants in the atmosphere are aggravating respiratory functions in those who have historically had respiratory problems and also damaging the health of developing children. They live in this environment and can't get out of it. We can't just tell them to move, their economic situation probably doesn't always allow them to. Therefore, this is a more serious safety issue than traffic accidents because this safety issue is continually occurring. Robbery, rape, organized crime; these things happen but toxic air quality is constantly effecting your body.

This is lowering life expectancy. This is a serious safety issue.

[Double L]

Also, the article refers to the Clean Air Act, which addresses airborn contaminants. The EPA's involvment in global warming is minimal in that they have programs addressing air quality, they do not have programs geared towards global warming.

Also, we do have programs to improve auto accidents, such as red light cameras and safe clear, several cities ban cell phones while driving and leaving your brights on in well lit neighborhoods. Traffic accidents are a perfectly reasonable thing to prevent. We also have building codes for elevators and escalators that the city of Houston enforces.

[Double L]

And to help us out...

Here are the proposals to solve this issue that I believe are on the agenda. Looks like red tape is also an issue with the timing of all this.

http://www.tceq.state.tx.us/rules/pendprop.html

From my research, looked like red tape was a big issue.

[RedScare]

Prove it, please. Cite sources where applicable. Thank you.

http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/292/19/2372

[TheNiche]

Public safety is of our highest priority. We cannot risk sacrificing a human beings health for money or our job creation. Job creation is not as important as a human lung.

Job creation allows a greater number of people to have the ability to practice good nutrition and access to healthcare. It also creates the tax base from which public safety projects may be financed.

Again, our economic well-being and our physical well-being are issues that are inescapably related. They must be balanced, and there must be trade-offs.

We are raising our level to the federal standards. That is a nationwide standard. That is of the most basic standard. So therefore this is the most basic health standard of air quality for an American citizen.

Regulatory standards don't necessarily mean anything. Regardless of who is in charge, do you honestly trust congress to get something--anything--right? I don't. I question them. I question their motives. I question the competency not only of our leaders, but of their constituents. And nothing is a foregone conclusion.

Why can't a private company put its money where it will respect the health of people living nearby internal combustion engine polluters. There are emission control techniques that can be done. I'm assuming we haven't done them yet, we just need to start. I just don't see why we don't put our efforts into both auto emissions and polluting buildings. We require that level of effort for our citizens.

Now what you are ignoring which is the most important thing is that right now there are thousands of Houstonians living in these conditions and the air quality is effecting their quality of health and shortening their lifespan.

The pollutants in the atmosphere are aggravating respiratory functions in those who have historically had respiratory problems and also damaging the health of developing children. They live in this environment and can't get out of it. We can't just tell them to move, their economic situation probably doesn't always allow them to. Therefore, this is a more serious safety issue than traffic accidents because this safety issue is continually occurring. Robbery, rape, organized crime; these things happen but toxic air quality is constantly effecting your body.

This is lowering life expectancy. This is a serious safety issue.

Reasonable measures should be taken if the expected payoff exceeds the cost of the necessary regulation and investments. Extreme measures have a tendency of backfiring, however.

Information allows people to make the choice of whether or not they want to move. Perhaps not everybody is bothered by it. Perhaps some people are. Let them make their own decisions. I do not advocate "tell[ing] them to move". It is their decision...and to say that moving is an impossibility because of economic hardship is B.S. If that were the case, illegal immigration wouldn't exist.

You mention that pollution affects everybody constantly, while violent crime and auto accidents affect people individually and in an episodic sort of way. But they're all inescapable and I'm not quite sure how they are all that dissimilar when you average it all out...except of course that crime and accidents remove a lot of very productive individuals in the prime of their lives, while the cumulative effects of pollution tend to shave off a few years at the point where people are so old as to be more a drain on society's resources than contributors...and that's assuming that your statements are correct. I still want to see documented proof that ozone is killing people.

This is lowering life expectancy. This is a serious safety issue.

Yes, but so are many other issues. We can't deal with all of them. It is beyond our means.

Poverty is another serious issue. I'd suggest that it is much more serious than asthma and respiratory irritation. Do you disagree, or shall we go off on a tangent about proper nutrition and access to preventative medicine?

[TheNiche]

http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/292/19/2372

A 10-ppb increase in the previous week

[Houston19514]

We cannot risk sacrificing a human beings health for money or our job creation. Job creation is not as important as a human lung.

That is patently ridiculous. We "risk sacrificing a human beings health" for "money or our job creation" every single day, as we must. To pretend otherwise is just silly. It is simple economics... the allocation of limited resources to meet unlimited "needs".

We could require that all vehicles be as heavy and indestructible as a tank in order to avoid risking any human beings health. But we (as a society) have chosen to take that risk. We could all live in bubbles to avoid damage (from both naturally occurring elements and "man-made" elements) to our human lungs, but we (at least most of us) choose to assume the risk. As The Niche said, we could require the elmination of stairs, because a lot of people fall on them, making them a risk to human beings' health; but we choose not to because of money/job creation.

Human society does not currently have sufficient resources to make the world perfectly safe for human beings' health. Therefore, allocations have to be made, lines have to be drawn, and we indeed have to "risk sacrificing human beings' health for money or job creation.

[Double L]

We can't let people breath unclean air. Your proposal basically says that we allow that to happen. Unclean air is a completely different issue than traffic safety efficiency or building codes. This aggravates those who have respiratory problems!

Reasonable measures should be taken if the expected payoff exceeds the cost of the necessary regulation and investments. Extreme measures have a tendency of backfiring, however.

I don't agree with you that the financial situation should decide the issue. The human health outweighs any economic balance. We should spend more than we take in in the case that we are protecting our citizens from harm and this is a necessity for an induviual to be protected from.

If you were somebody with respiratory problems and you lived in an area with Nitrogen Oxides in the lower atmosphere would say "well I could fall down the stairs anytime, so this is no diffferent"? No, because you might not fall down the stairs or be robbed, but you will breath toxic acids, no matter what. As I said before, these are not extreme measures, the federal government set this as the national standards which means it is the same for every part of this country and our 50 big metropolitan area cities. A superpower first world country set this as the standards for dozens of big cities in all different situations.

I think that we don't want the economy to collapse but we do want businesses to have a level of safety with their services. If the economy collapses that violates safety, but noticed I cited job growth we probably won't lose jobs. Federal mandates are the result of a widespread debate, they may not be perfect but every other city in the country is also under them. So we are not dealing with competition economically within this country, that is why we will probably not lose jobs.

This is forcing thousands of Houstonians to live in conditions which every single moment of the day aggravates their respiratory system. This is not comparable to other safety issues. This is not going to result in unfair competition between Houston and other cities within this nation because it is the federal governments regulation that it decided was fair for businesses.

Texas is putting itself at lower standards than the rest of the nation in order to selfishly bring job growth not to prevent the economy from collapsing. It is only us and LA, Jersey did it, Atlanta did it, Houston and LA didn't do it.

[Double L]

Let me remind you that the proposals I see here seem pretty basic to me. They seem like they are things private businesses should be doing anyways and if this effects our economy, competition with other U.S cities is not a factor. Also, the federal government has stated that it believes that this will be fair for our international competition.

http://www.tceq.state.tx.us/rules/pendprop.html

Also, we have not yet addressed what Georgia did. I say we implement a state organization to handle transportation pollution issues in Texas. That way we can solve all the issues at hand multilaterally not unilaterally (auto emmissions) as TCEQ wants to.

[TheNiche]

We can't let people breath unclean air. Your proposal basically says that we allow that to happen. Unclean air is a completely different issue than traffic safety efficiency or building codes. This aggravates those who have respiratory problems!

We can, and we have. That much should be self-evident. My only "proposal" (not having drawn one up) is to be reasonable with respect to the allocation of society's resources such that we get the most benefit for the least cost. Beyond that, I am probably not qualified to determine specifics. But I do consider myself qualified to point out common sense. And clean air is just one of many issues that need to be addressed. To single it out as an issue because it affects some people has no merit. There are many other matters of public health that affect other people...many more other people in much more harmful ways.

If you were somebody with respiratory problems and you lived in an area with Nitrogen Oxides in the lower atmosphere would say "well I could fall down the stairs anytime, so this is no diffferent"? No, because you might not fall down the stairs or be robbed, but you will breath toxic acids, no matter what. As I said before, these are not extreme measures, the federal government set this as the national standards which means it is the same for every part of this country and our 50 big metropolitan area cities. A superpower first world country set this as the standards for dozens of big cities in all different situations.

Since when were we talking about nitrogen oxides? I'm not. And if I were afflicted by respiratory problems caused by nitrous oxides, I'd relocate to a place with less of them. Very simple. A lot of people move to different cities to escape particular kinds of allergies. In my view, this is no different...and Houston is such a big place that it may not even require moving to a new city so much as it could be a cross-town move. Some neighborhoods have it better than others.

By the way, I do not consider the episodic nature of crime to make it an incomparable risk. People make decisions about where to live and how to go about their lives as a matter of perceived risk. It's all in the averages. Simply multiply the potential damage by the probability that it will occur. There's your risk measurement.

Also, as I've already stated, I don't trust the government to get air standards right. Environmentalists don't, either. They're all pissy about our not having signed the Kyoto agreement. Politicians are fallable...you do comprehend that, right?

I think that we don't want the economy to collapse but we do want businesses to have a level of safety with their services. If the economy collapses that violates safety, but noticed I cited job growth we probably won't lose jobs. Federal mandates are the result of a widespread debate, they may not be perfect but every other city in the country is also under them. So we are not dealing with competition economically within this country, that is why we will probably not lose jobs.

This is just nonsense. Forgoing job creation in order to carry out policy imposes an opportunity cost upon society. An opportunity cost is still a cost. And I just don't know what to say about this "we are not dealing with competition economically within this country, that is why we will probably not lose jobs" quote. I just don't understand what you're trying to say here.

This is forcing thousands of Houstonians to live in conditions which every single moment of the day aggravates their respiratory system. This is not comparable to other safety issues.

Only thousands? That's all? Assuming 9,999 Houstonians were afflicted, that'd only be about two tenths of a percent of all residents. Why do they deserve special treatment? ...or you might explain your numbers a bit better.

Below is the comparative historical data on LA vs. Houston. LA has made more progress, but then again, they had more progress to be made. It's not as though we haven't made progress, ourselves, over the same time period, either. One thing that should be borne in mind as a big difference between LA and Houston, btw, is that the EPA will count a day as being unacceptable if one of many sensors gets a reading that is too high. In Houston, most of our pollution is pretty well concentrated within an area with relatively low population density...and then it blows away, dispersed and diluted into the atmosphere. We typically only set off a few of the sensors on a regular basis. There are neighborhoods on the west side, on the other hand, that have relatively clean air. In LA, the ozone creation isn't as concentrated and it tends to linger over the city, trapped by mountains. Far more people are exposed on typical unacceptable days than are exposed in Houston.

[Double L]

Only thousands? That's all? Assuming 9,999 Houstonians were afflicted, that'd only be about two tenths of a percent of all residents. Why do they deserve special treatment? ...or you might explain your numbers a bit better.

Well, there isn't necessarily a constant ozone threat, only on bad days. So the numbers of people effected by this isn't constant, but are the numbers more important than the people to you? All it takes is one person to have negative health effects from this for it to be a serious problem. You would really say that if there were few enough people undergoing negative health effects then it's not worth our resources? How much common sense is that? This is a safety issue that is a consistent issue and our city is one of the worst for these pollutants, so it is certainly one of our priorities.

We can, and we have. That much should be self-evident.

We can't, not any more. It is far too important. This is human biology. This is one of the most important services we have to provide. Now, in the proposals that I read on TCEQ's website, we are dealing with stricter controls on private businesses and only some government spending. Our resource spending on this issue is done mainly by the private businesses. The federal government believes that this level of enforcement on private businesses resources is reasonable within their clean air act. Why should we overpower them?

Also, I believe resources are best invested where a safety issue is involved. Our city is one of the worse violators for ozone pollutants, we are the energy capital of the world. Air quality is one of our highest issues. Residents here are more highly effected by theses issues than residents in all the other regions in America except one. Let's force government and businesses to put their resources towards a safety issue which highly effects our region.

[KinkaidAlum]

What is really scary is that this is the watered-down Republican-filtered EPA coming out with these warnings.

The EPA isn't filled with eco-friendly tree-huggin liberal freaks anymore. They all left once they realized they were just pawns.

[TheNiche]

Well, there isn't necessarily a constant ozone threat, only on bad days. So the numbers of people effected by this isn't constant, but are the numbers more important than the people to you? All it takes is one person to have negative health effects from this for it to be a serious problem. You would really say that if there were few enough people undergoing negative health effects then it's not worth our resources? How much common sense is that?

We can't, not any more. It is far too important. This is human biology. This is one of the most important services we have to provide.

About 2,000 people per year die from snake bites in the United States. This comprises a tiny tiny fraction of all accidental deaths and an even tinier fraction of all mortality. One of those that died of a snakebite was my half brother, many years ago. Do I go around advocating that the government undertake a snake extermination policy? Do I advocate a policy that all persons romping around in the great outdoors need to wear snake gaiters lest they be fined? Or a policy that makes it a crime for parents with very young children to live in a rural area that is too far from a hospital? Any of these things could've prevented my half-brother's death. And he's just one person. He died; he incurred a massive burden. Does that justify forcing a small burden upon so many other thousands that won't die of a snakebite?

Common sense. No.

Now, in the proposals that I read on TCEQ's website, we are dealing with stricter controls on private businesses and only some government spending. Our resource spending on this issue is done mainly by the private businesses. The federal government believes that this level of enforcement on private businesses resources is reasonable within their clean air act. Why should we overpower them?

Also, I believe resources are best invested where a safety issue is involved. Our city is one of the worse violators for ozone pollutants, we are the energy capital of the world. Air quality is one of our highest issues. Residents here are more highly effected by theses issues than residents in all the other regions in America except one. Let's force government and businesses to put their resources towards a safety issue which highly effects our region.

It doesn't matter who incurs the cost. If it is private industry operating in a competitive markets, the costs will just get passed straight on through to the consumer by way of higher prices. If the government incurs the cost, it'll be taken from consumers and businesses via taxes, and again, businesses will just pass along what they have to in order to remain profitable. And even when you think you've nailed the fat cats with a particular luxury tax, guess what'll happen to all those blue collar folks that procure and manufacture those luxury goods? They're the ones that suffer. It's all connected. There is no foolproof way around it. The bottom line is that scarce resources need to be reasonably allocated to an infinitude of human 'needs'.

I still contend that the biggest problem with ozone in Houston is that it prevents access to federal funding for transportation projects. It isn't that there isn't an impact on health, just that there are more pressing concerns that deserve the attention, not only as a matter of economic growth, but as a matter of human health and safety. That's all.

[DJ V Lawrence]

That is patently ridiculous. We "risk sacrificing a human beings health" for "money or our job creation" every single day, as we must. To pretend otherwise is just silly. It is simple economics... the allocation of limited resources to meet unlimited "needs".

That's our #1 problem right there. Why do we have to assume that we have to give up one for another? Maybe it would be more expensive at times to to certain things in a more environmentally friendly way especially for chemical companies, but if a job at a chemical plant's not available, find a job someplace else...

[TheNiche]

That's our #1 problem right there. Why do we have to assume that we have to give up one for another? Maybe it would be more expensive at times to to certain things in a more environmentally friendly way especially for chemical companies, but if a job at a chemical plant's not available, find a job someplace else...

By commuting to a gig or going overseas, you take a risk that you will be injured or killed in a car accident, a violent crime, or any number of other mishaps. Your personal risk is increased by the fact that you have to be mobile. And yet, you continue to be a DJ and military man, professions that require a high degree of mobility. Why do you endure the risk? You need money (and hopefully intrinsic value from your job) and are willing to take reasonable risks in the pursuit of the benefit. This is a mundane example, but a valid one, of the tradeoffs that must be made on a personal basis every day. The government cannot reasonably eliminate those risks for you, and you probably wouldn't expect (or necessarily want) them to.

Similarly, there are limits to the extent that we can (or would want to) provide clean air. There gets to be a point at which we are willing to endure the health risks in exchange for the well-being provided by economic activity. As with all externalities, there is a socially optimal level of air pollution. The big difference between this and traffic congestion, for instance, is that it isn't as costly yet is more costly to fix.

[Double L]

All it takes is one person to undergo such painful chemicals moving through their lungs and getting trapped there causing asthma on a DAILY basis for us to say that the benefit is worth the effort of preventing such an occurence. The numbers of people effected should be outweighed by the danger of the occurence therefore making it more important.

For people living in the East End (and trust me, most don't want to be there) breathing toxic chemicals has a 100% chance of happening on a bad ozone day. It is not 20%, not 50%, not 2,000 incidents a year or a freak occurence. This is not an event that occurs, this is a state of being, this is a way of life. Sure, we don't wanna go around killing all snakes or eliminating all ozone chemicals, but we do want plenty of snake-bite vaccines and plenty of locations to distribute them, we also want our air quality to reach American federal government standards.

The federal government deemed in its clean air act that this is the right balance for our country between the economy and the safety. Who are we, little ol' Houston of around 2 million people to challenge big ol' United States of America of 300 million people?

[Double L]

Instead of copping out and relying on future auto emmission reductions to clean our ozone in Houston likE TCEQ wants let's do both. Let's wait for auto emmission reductions to occur along with placing stricter laws on businesses. Then let's also create an authority in Texas like TxDot which will constantly work with transportation pollutant issues (as suggested in the article). Then we can move ahead of the federal governments standards.

[TheNiche]

All it takes is one person to undergo such painful chemicals moving through their lungs and getting trapped there causing asthma on a DAILY basis for us to say that the benefit is worth the effort of preventing such an occurence. The numbers of people effected should be outweighed by the danger of the occurence therefore making it more important.

No...it isn't.

Unless I'm that person.

For people living in the East End (and trust me, most don't want to be there) breathing toxic chemicals has a 100% chance of happening on a bad ozone day. It is not 20%, not 50%, not 2,000 incidents a year or a freak occurence. This is not an event that occurs, this is a state of being, this is a way of life. Sure, we don't wanna go around killing all snakes or eliminating all ozone chemicals, but we do want plenty of snake-bite vaccines and plenty of locations to distribute them, we also want our air quality to reach American federal government standards.

You may not be aware of this, but I just recently bought a home in the East End; I intend to turn it around and flip it to a yuppie buyer. There are also quite a few East Enders on this forum, and some of us aren't even dirt poor and could live in many other places if we so chose. In fact, one of the two locations for my ideal home is within 1,000 feet of the Houston Ship Channel. (Hmm...I think I'll start a thread about ideal homes in a few minutes.) I suppose we're all just a bunch of suicidal nuts, eh?

I hate to burst your bubble, but breathing toxic chemicals has a 100% chance of happening to anybody on any given day. We also ingest toxic chemicals. If I'm not mistaken, I think the number was on the order of several grams per day on average, with or without organic foods. There simply is no such thing as a 100% solution. And believe it or not, even the Federal government standards that you harp on so frequently allow for this fact.

The federal government deemed in its clean air act that this is the right balance for our country between the economy and the safety. Who are we, little ol' Houston of around 2 million people to challenge big ol' United States of America of 300 million people?

You do know that you, one person in 300 million, can sue the federal government, right? Is there a lawyer in the house that wants to hit this one out of the ballpark?

You may also have noticed that our elected officials are frequently fallable and/or incompetent. Just because they have the power to decree law doesn't mean that the law provides for the best solution to a problem.

[Guest Marty]

Do fireplaces affect the air quality very much? because in my hood they burn them every night even if it 70 degrees. It drives me nuts

[KinkaidAlum]

Wood burning fireplaces can affect air quality. Many ski towns across the nation have banned new construction from putting them in. They have to go the gas route instead. Of course, ski villages run into the problem of the surrounding mountains trapping the fumes whereas in Houston, the steady breezes just tend to blow the mess elsewhere.