For Immediate Release, March 24, 2005

Contact: Susan Martin Tel: 415/955-6120

Finds Environmental Groups Using Misinformation to Scare Californians

SAN FRANCISCO – A comprehensive new study by top air quality and climate experts discredits recent claims that global warming will lead to more bad air days in California and other states. The analysis shows that the air quality throughout the nation has dramatically improved over the last 30 years despite generally increasing urban temperatures. Regulation of greenhouse gas emissions will have no effect on air quality.

Air Quality False Alarm: An Analysis of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s “Heat Advisory” Report was published today by the Pacific Research Institute, United for Jobs, The Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Solutions, Commonwealth Foundation for Public Policy Alternatives, and The John Locke Foundation.

“The Natural Resource Defense Council’s “Heat Advisory” study claims that bad air days and global warming are linked - this is false and misleading,” said Dr. Steven Hayward, a PRI senior fellow.

“Parts of California have the worst air quality in the nation, but California has also made the greatest improvements. For example, the Los Angeles area has reduced exceedances of the 1-hour and 8-hour ozone standards by more 90 and 80 percent, respectively, since the 1980s,” said Joel Schwartz, co-author of Air Quality False Alarm.

According to EPA ozone monitoring data, over the last 30 years ozone levels have declined even though urban temperatures have increased. On average, U.S. cities have achieved a 95 percent decrease in the number of “red alert” days (1-hour ozone exceedances) per year and a 75 percent decrease in the number of “orange alert” days (8-hour ozone exceedances). Increasing urban temperatures are attributable to the “urban heat island” effect, rather than global warming.

The authors of Air Quality False Alarm show that the NRDC report is just another example of radical environmentalists using scare tactics to push their legislative agenda. By exaggerating both future warming and future smog levels, and then trying to assert a false link between warming and air quality, the green lobby hopes to pass legislation such as the McCain-Lieberman bill.

“The fact is that legislation such as McCain-Lieberman will do nothing to affect climate change and could cost Californian households as much as $2,255 per year,” said PRI’s Steven Hayward.

Californians should not be fooled by the claims that such legislation would produce environmental benefits or that it would bring jobs to the state. Neither could be farther from the truth.

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About PRI
For 26 years, the Pacific Research Institute (PRI) has championed freedom, opportunity, and individual responsibility through free-market policy solutions. PRI is a non-profit, non-partisan organization.