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CNN Live Today
Half of Americans Live With Dangerous Air
Aired May 01, 2002 - 12:14 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: About half of all Americans are living in areas where just breathing the air, we are told, could endanger your health. That's the word today from the American Lung Association in its annual "State of the Air" report.
Our environmental correspondent, Natalie Pawelski, now will look at the best and the worst places, according to this study anyway, the best and worst places to breathe in America.
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(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From coast to smoggy coast, half of all Americans are living dangerously in places where air pollution levels, the report says, can be hazardous to your health.
JOHN KIRKWOOD, PRESIDENT & CEO, AMERICAN LUNG ASSOCIATION: There actually has been an increase of about 18 percent in the areas that are rated an F, which is unhealthy.
PAWELSKI: For the third year in a row, the four smoggiest cities are in California: L.A., Bakersfield, Fresno and Visalia. Houston, Texas came in fifth. Atlanta ranked sixth, followed by Merced, California Knoxville, Tennessee, Charlotte, North Carolina and Sacramento.
All of these cities scored Fs for ground level ozone. Note most on the list are hot and sunny. Start with the pollution most cities have. Nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons from tail pipe emissions and smoke stack pollution, mix in the heat and the sunlight, and you get ozone. That's the main ingredient in smog.
Ozone is especially dangerous for people with asthma, children and the elderly.
KIRKWOOD: Because ozone is an irritant. It is like getting a sunburn on your airways, and that affects everyone.
PAWELSKI: But some Americans are breathing relatively freely in cities that earned an A, suffering no smog alerts from 1998 through 2000. That list includes Bellingham, Washington, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Duluth, Minnesota, Fargo, North Dakota and Flagstaff, Arizona. Also on that clean list, Honolulu, Laredo, Texas, Lincoln, Nebraska, McAllen, Texas, Salinas, California and Spokane, Washington.
Some of these cities are relatively low smog, because of climate or geography. Others have less traffic or fewer industrial sources of pollution.
KIRKWOOD: You can't do anything about the weather and topography. What you have you to address are the sources of hydrocarbon and nitrogen oxide emissions.
PAWELSKI: Cleaning up the sources of that pollution from the plants that power homes and businesses to the tailpipes on America's increasingly crowded roads will not be easy.
(on camera): Case in point, right here in Atlanta, one of the sprawl capitals of the universe, and Atlantans drive more miles than almost any other Americans. All of that traffic means a lot of pollution, and our climate, which is usually pretty hot and sunny, that can gets baked into a lot of smog. And efforts to get Atlantans out of their cars and into mass transit and into car pools haven't made much of a dent, one example of one city of what cities across the country are trying to do to battle the smog problems.
Natalie Pawelski, CNN, Atlanta.
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PAWELSKI: And fixing that kind of problem, we've got a case in point here in Atlanta. Atlantans drive more on average than almost any other Americans, and yet efforts to get them out of their cars and into mass transit and telecommuting really haven't proven very successful. That is just one example of the kinds of dilemma faced by cities with smog problems all across the country -- Bill.
HEMMER: A most interesting point, Natalie. Go back to the list. About a year ago, Houston was being absolutely flogged for its air quality. It ranked No. 1 according to several studies that we saw and observed. They dropped down on the list somewhat. Is there any indication as to what they are doing right in Houston, Texas that may drop them lower? Or are the other cities just getting worse?
PAWELSKI: A cynic would say they are not doing much right. Bill, a lot of these different lists that we see look at different pollutants. This study only looks at ozone, in other words, the basic building block of smog. It did not take into account other things that can cause serious air pollution problems, like particulate matter is one thing, soot essentially, or mercury or sulfur dioxide emissions that can contribute to acid rain.
So this only looked at one kind of air pollution, one that has serious effects for human health as you would expect from the American Lung Association.
HEMMER: Got it. OK, Natalie, thanks -- Natalie Pawelski outside here in the city of Atlanta.
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