Editorial: Cleaner air will require cleaner fuels

Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2004 | 8:41 a.m.

It's been seven years since the Environmental Protection Agency ordered a new, stricter air-quality standard for ground-level ozone. Court challenges by industries whose plants have high emissions held up the standards until this year. Now the pressure is on for local governments to write plans for how they will meet the new standard. Clark County, which monitors ozone at 14 locations, has three years to write a plan that will enable its urban and industrialized areas to meet the new standard. It will have two years beyond that to implement the plan.

Ozone at the ground level (unlike atmospheric ozone that protects us against the sun's ultraviolet rays) is unhealthy. It can damage lungs and aggravate existing respiratory conditions such as asthma, bronchitis and emphysema. It can cause heart problems, headaches, eye irritation, nasal congestion and coughing. Usually odorless and invisible at the ground level, ozone becomes thick and yellowish brown as it rises and hangs over urban areas as smog. Here in Las Vegas, on some days, it obscures the view of the Strip.

Studies of ozone reveal it to be a very complex pollutant, formed mainly by the integration of sunlight with industrial and vehicle emissions. Southern Nevada's ozone season coincides with the duration of the most intense sunlight, from May 1 through Oct. 1. Our climate and nation-leading growth have created ideal conditions for ozone production. As such, we were glad to hear Bob Folle, a county air-quality official, say the goal here is to achieve an early compliance with the new federal standard.

With few industrial sites locally, we believe the county's plan should be weighted heavily toward providing incentives for the use of alternative fuels. Monorails and light rails are fun to envision, but their costs are prohibitive. We'll never escape from our blinding sunlight, but we could move more rapidly toward much cleaner technologies, such as hybrid cars, and trucks and buses that use biodiesel fuel.