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In 2004, upon adopting a new National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for ground level ozone air pollution, the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) identified two Eastern Shore counties, Kent and Queen Anne’s, as failing to meet the new eight-hour ozone standard.
Those counties were classified as “marginal nonattainment.”
After two years of dedicated work by the counties, citizens, businesses and the State, the EPA approved Maryland’s request to classify the two counties as an being in attainment of the eight-hour ozone standard on December 22, 2006. This is evidence of the tremendous progress being made to improve Maryland’s air quality.
Breaking New Ground with Ground-level Detection
Ground level ozone is a secondary pollutant formed when pollutants (nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds) from motor vehicles, chemical solvents and power plants react to sunlight. Exposure to ozone can cause respiratory distress, damage lung tissue and aggravate existing respiratory illnesses. Ground level ozone pollution levels have a greater potential of elevating during warmer months, as intense sunlight is required to change certain primary pollutants into ozone.
The State of Maryland has established one of the nation’s most extensive networks of air quality monitors to track a variety of pollutants. This facilitates notifying the public when unhealthy levels are recorded. In 1979, the EPA promulgated the one-hour ozone standard of 125 parts per billion (ppb). In 1997, based on the updated scientific view that the ozone standard was not sufficiently protective of public health, the EPA recommended a revised standard of 85 ppb measured over an eight-hour period. This standard took effect in 2004. The one-hour ozone standard was consequently revoked in June 2005.
Two Counties Now Meet New Ozone Standard
Kent and Queen Anne’s Counties comprised the first nonattainment area in Maryland to comply with the old one-hour ozone standard. Businesses, citizens, and the State have joined together to implement an impressive amount of pollution controls that helped the region meet the ozone standard. This has allowed Maryland to request that Kent and Queen Anne’s Counties be redesignated to attainment for the new eight-hour standard.
“On some days, under certain weather conditions, a significant amount of ozone detected at the air monitor for Kent and Queen Anne’s is from transport,” explains Tad Aburn, director of the Air and Radiation Management Administration. “High concentrations of ozone can come from downwind sources and the Washington and Baltimore nonattainment areas, which degrades the air in these Eastern Shore counties. The pollution control and reduction strategies in the larger nonattainment areas have helped with improving air quality in Kent and Queen Anne’s Counties,” says Aburn.
Along with Maryland’s request for attainment redesignation, the EPA approved the state’s air quality maintenance plan to set in place measures to keep these counties in attainment through 2018.
(Jim Wilkinson is a Natural Resources Planner with Maryland Department of the Environment’s Air Quality Planning Program.)
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