America's Most Polluted Cities 2010

America's Most Polluted Cities 2010

Tim Kiladze, Forbes.com

Apr 28th, 2010

President Obama's recent proposal to open some areas along the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic coastline and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling elicited praise from drilling advocates and oil companies as well as sharp criticism from environmental groups and citizens near the areas that might be affected.

List: Worst Cities For Ozone Pollution

The environmental impacts from doing so won't be felt for some time. What's affecting Americans today? Poor air quality. This matter often gets buried under more high-profile concerns like climate change, but it is particularly important as summer approaches because sunlight is a key ingredient in making harmful ozone, a ground level gas that contributes to urban smog and inflames the lungs, causing shortness of breath, wheezing and throat irritation.

Sunny areas like Los Angeles face the harmful effects of ozone year-round. In fact, the Los Angeles metro is named the country's worst for ozone by the American Lung Association's State of the Air 2010 report, released Wednesday. The ranking is worrisome for the city's residents because inhaling ozone is akin to "getting a sunburn on your airways," says Dr. Norman H. Edelman, the ALA's chief medical officer.

Other California metros didn't fare much better:Bakersfield, Visalia, Fresno and Sacramento round out the five worst regions for ozone. The problem is statewide because of both California's exposure to sunlight and a natural geography that allows pollution to hover rather than diffuse to other areas, says Janice Nolen, the ALA's assistant vice president for policy and advocacy.

The State of the Air report also ranks cities based on short-term and year-round particle pollution, which are caused by emissions of sulfur dioxide, carbon and nitrogen oxides. The short-term measure ranks metros by periodic spikes in airborne particles, and Bakersfield, Calif.; Fresno, Calif.; Pittsburgh; Los Angeles; andBirmingham, Ala., were, by this measure, found to have the country's five worst.

Some of these cities also show up in the rankings for year-round particle pollution, which measures the daily average level of airborne particles. The five worst areas are: Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, Ariz.; Bakersfield, Calif.;Los Angeles; Visalia, Calif.; and Pittsburgh.

Behind The Numbers

State of the Air 2010 ranks metropolitan statistical areas and combined statistical areas based on data collected by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) between 2006 and 2008. Both the ozone and short-term particle pollution rankings are based on spikes in their daily measurements and were calculated using weighted averages; each level of the Air Quality index was given a numerical weight, and these values were then multiplied by the number of days each metro reached them. Contrarily, the year-round particle pollution rankings are based on the average daily airborne particle levels during the three years studied.

The ALA found that over 175 million Americans, or 58% of the population, live in counties with unhealthy levels of either ozone or particle pollution. Worse, almost 24 million people live in counties with unhealthy levels of ozone and both short-term and year-round particle pollution.

Poorer populations are especially vulnerable. "People in poverty often live near major highways, near sources of pollution," Nolen says.

What's more, bad air impacts Americans' wallets. Using data from various environmental groups as well as California's Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development, which indicates where, when, and why people were admitted to the emergency room or had a hospital visit, the RAND corporation found that from 2005 to 2007 California's dirty air resulted in more than $193 million in hospital-based medical care. Medicare and Medi-Cal, the state's Medicaid program, paid for about two-thirds of the expenses, placing the financial burden on taxpayers.

Bad But Getting Better

The news isn't all gloomy. Twenty of the 25 worst metros for year-round particle pollution reported lower particle levels this year than in the 2009 report. Sixteen cities including Pittsburgh and Atlanta also reported their lowest year-round particle pollutions levels since the ALA released its first State of the Air report in 2004.

These improvements should only continue given the aggressive regulations announced last decade. In 2005 the EPA introduced the Clean Air Interstate Rule, which forces companies in 28 states, predominately in the eastern half of the country where coal-fired power plants burn most often, to cut their sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emissions. A year earlier it also announced the Clean Air Nonroad Diesel Rule, which places tough emissions requirements on diesel engines used in various industries including construction, agriculture and mining. In 2004 these emissions accounted for 47% of all diesel particulate pollution, according to the EPA.

The bar may be raised even higher this year. In February Sens. Tom Carper, D-Del., and Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., proposed the Clean Air Act Amendments of 2010, legislation that would impose stricter limits on mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants and place tougher national limits on sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emissions. If passed, these new rules will be the first amendments to the EPA's Clean Air Act in 20 years.

5 Worst Cities For Ozone Pollution

1. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Riverside, Calif.
Total Population: 17,786,419
Pediatric Asthma: 442,040
Adult Asthma: 1,094,827
Chronic Bronchitis: 556,68
Emphysema: 200,338

2. Bakersfield, Calif.
Total Population: 800,458
Pediatric Asthma: 22,479
Adult Asthma: 46,597
Chronic Bronchitis: 23,265
Emphysema: 7,790

3. Visalia-Porterville, Calif.
Total Population: 426,276
Pediatric Asthma: 12,749
Adult Asthma: 24,202
Chronic Bronchitis: 12,169
Emphysema: 4,249

4. Fresno-Madera, Calif.
Total Population: 1,057,486
Pediatric Asthma: 29,351
Adult Asthma: 62,100
Chronic Bronchitis: 31,280
Emphysema: 10,965

5. Sacramento--Arden-Arcade--Yuba City, Calif.-NV
Total Population: 2,417,404
Pediatric Asthma: 55,670
Adult Asthma: 153,359
Chronic Bronchitis: 78,640
Emphysema: 29,653

Click here to see the full list of Worst Cities For Ozone Pollution

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Weather hurts Gulf oil fight; new drilling on hold

Play VideoABC News – Coast Guard's Oil Spill-Containment Plan

• Slideshow:Gulf Coast oil spill
• Play VideoVideo:Raw: Footage of Thursday's oil burn in GulfWWL-TV, Channel 4 New Orleans

RELATED QUOTES

BP	51.94	-0.62
RIG	70.54	-7.97
XOM	68.76	+0.10

AP – Booms snake around land in Breton Sound near Plaquemines Parish in Louisiana Thursday, April 29, 2010. …

By CAIN BURDEAU, Associated Press Writer – 56 mins ago

MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER – Oil from a massive spill in theGulf of Mexico oozed into Louisiana's ecologically rich wetlands Friday as storms threatened to frustrate desperate protection efforts. The White House put a hold on any new offshore oil projects until the rig disaster that caused the spill is explained.

Crews in boats patrolled coastal marshes early Friday looking for areas where the oil has flowed in, the Coast Guard said.

The National Weather Service predicted winds, high tides and waves through Sunday that could push oil deep into the inlets, ponds and lakes that line the boot of southeast Louisiana. Seas of 6 to 7 feet were pushing tides several feet above normal toward the coast, compounded by thunderstorms expected in the area Friday.

Crews are unable to skim oil from the surface or burn it off for the next couple of days because of the weather, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Sally Brice-O'Hara said on ABC's "Good Morning America."

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Waves may also wash over booms strung out just off shorelines to stop the oil, said Tom McKenzie, a spokesman for U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is hoping booms will keep oil off the Chandeleur Islands, part of a national wildlife refuge.

"The challenge is, are they going to hold up in any kind of serious weather," McKenzie said. "And if there's oil, will the oil overcome the barriers even though they're ... executed well?"

A top adviser to President Barack Obama said Friday that no new oil drilling would be allowed until authorities learn what caused the explosion of the rig Deepwater Horizon. David Axelrod told ABC's "Good Morning America" that "no additional drilling has been authorized and none will until we find out what has happened here." Obama recently lifted a drilling moratorium for many offshore areas, including the Atlantic and Gulf areas.

Two Air Force C-130s were sent to Mississippi and awaited orders to start dumping chemicals on the oil spill. The Navy also sent equipment for the cleanup and Pentagon officials were talking with the Department of Homeland Security to figure out what other help the military could give.

The leak from a blown-out well a mile underwater is five times bigger than first believed. Faint fingers of oily sheen began reaching the Mississippi River delta late Thursday, lapping the Louisiana shoreline in long, thin lines. Thicker oil was farther offshore. Officials have said they would do everything to keep the Mississippi River open to traffic.

Photos: Oil spill off Louisiana coast

View slideshow

The Coast Guard defended the federal response so far. Asked on all three network television morning shows Friday whether the government has done enough to push oil company BP PLC to plug the underwater leak and protect the coast, Brice-O'Hara said the response led by the Coast Guard has been rapid, sustained and has adapted as the threat grew since a drill rig exploded and sank last week, causing the seafloor spill.

The oil slick could become the nation's worst environmental disaster in decades, threatening to eclipse even the Exxon Valdez in scope. It imperils hundreds of species of fish, birds and other wildlife along the Gulf Coast, one of the world's richest seafood grounds, teeming with shrimp, oysters and other marine life.

"It is of grave concern," David Kennedy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told The Associated Press about the spill. "I am frightened. This is a very, very big thing. And the efforts that are going to be required to do anything about it, especially if it continues on, are just mind-boggling."

Oil clumps seabirds' feathers, leaving them without insulation — and when they preen, they swallow it. Prolonged contact with the skin can cause burns, said Nils Warnock, a spill recovery supervisor with the California Oiled Wildlife Care Network at the University of California-Davis. Oil swallowed by animals can cause anemia, hemorrhaging and other problems, said Jay Holcomb, executive director of the International Bird Rescue Research Center in California.

The spewing oil — about 210,000 gallons a day — comes from a well drilled by the rig Deepwater Horizon, which exploded in flames April 20 and sank two days later. BP was operating the rig that was owned byTransocean Ltd. The Coast Guard is working with BP to deploy floating booms, skimmers and chemical dispersants, and set controlled fires to burn the oil off the water's surface.

The leak from the ocean floor proved to be far bigger than initially reported, contributing to a growing sense among some in Louisiana that the government failed them again, just as it did during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. President Obama dispatched Cabinet officials to deal with the crisis.

Cade Thomas, a fishing guide in Venice, worried that his livelihood will be destroyed. He said he did not know whether to blame the Coast Guard, the government or BP.

"They lied to us. They came out and said it was leaking 1,000 barrels when I think they knew it was more. And they weren't proactive," he said. "As soon as it blew up, they should have started wrapping it with booms."

BP shares continued falling early Friday. Shares were down 2 percent in early trading on the London Stock Exchange, a day after dropping 7 percent in London. In New York on Thursday, BP shares fell $4.78 to close at $52.56, taking the fall in the company's market value to about $25 billion since the explosion.

Government officials said the well 40 miles offshore is spewing about 5,000 barrels, or 200,000 gallons, a day into the gulf.

At that rate, the spill could eclipse the worst oil spill in U.S. history — the 11 million gallons that leaked from the grounded tanker Exxon Valdez in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 — in the three months it could take to drill a relief well and plug the gushing well 5,000 feet underwater on the sea floor. Ultimately, the spill could grow much larger than the Valdez because Gulf of Mexico wells tap deposits that hold many times more oil than a single tanker.

BP has requested more resources from the Defense Department, especially underwater equipment that might be better than what is commercially available. A BP executive said the corporation would "take help from anyone." That includes fishermen who could be hired to help deploy containment boom.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency so officials could begin preparing for the oil's impact. He also asked the federal government if he could call up 6,000 National Guard troops to help.

___

Associated Press writers Holbrook Mohr in Mississippi, Phuong Le in Seattle, Janet McConnaughey, Kevin McGill, Michael Kunzelman and Brett Martel in New Orleans, and Melinda Deslatte in Baton Rouge also contributed to this report.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100430/ap_on_bi_ge/us_louisiana_oil_rig_explosion_303