Clean Air News
New rules aim to reduce trucks' diesel emissions, by Joe Malinconico, Star Ledger, 7/3/07
Diesel trucks no longer will be able to idle for as long as 30 minutes when they warm up at the start of the day, under state regulations that took effect yesterday.
The state Department of Environmental Protection eliminated two exemptions to its three-minute limit on truck idling. One had allowed trucks to run for 30 minutes at the operators' place of business. The other allowed trucks to idle for up to 15 minutes when drivers restarted vehicles after they had been off for at least three hours.
State officials estimate the new regulations, along with an increased public awareness campaign, will eliminate 100 tons of diesel emissions per year, or about 1 percent of the output by transportation vehicles in the state. Violators are subject to a penalty of $250 to $1,000 per day for each vehicle.
"If they reduce diesel pollutants in the air by 100 tons a year, that will reduce the number of people who get sick and die from them," said Dave Pringle of the New Jersey Environmental Federation. "But the $20,000 question is how aggressively they're going to enforce this..."
Group pushes for air pollution measures, Michael Rispoli, Asbury Park Press, 03/08/07
TRENTON — New Jersey needs to do more to reduce diesel and fine particle air pollution, especially for the health of those living near high concentrations of the asthma-causing particles, an environmental justice group said Wednesday.
The New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance called on Gov. Corzine and the state Department of Environmental Protection to push beyond a 2005 state law by requiring diesel-powered vehicles used to fulfill state contracts to be retrofitted with clean emission technology, to enforce diesel-powered vehicles idling laws and to accelerate efforts to reducing diesel emission in "hot spots" — urban areas, transportation corridors and ports.
Asthma is one of the major effects of exposure to these particles, said the group, which also listed cancer, heart attacks and strokes as other health problems associated with inhaling the toxins.
Kim Gaddy, environmental justice organizer of the New Jersey Environmental Federation, said as a mother of three asthmatic children, she can see the effect air pollutants have on the lungs everyday.
"Daily there are buses and trucks that go up and down our highways right around schools and around places where our children recreate," said Gaddy. "You can't escape diesel, it's everywhere."
New EPA plan will leave some New Jersey residents breathing easier, News 12 NJ, 03/02/07
NEWARK - New Jersey residents may soon breathe easier after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a plan to cut diesel pollution Friday.
The federal government’s plan calls for cutting diesel pollution from trains and some boats by at least 80 percent. Old locomotives, tugboats and pleasure boats will be re-manufactured to today’s standards under the proposal.
EPA officials say some details of the plan must still be worked out, but some local environmentalists are happy with it so far. The EPA administrator expects the new diesel emissions standards to go into effect next year. The EPA also predicts lowering diesel emissions will have a dramatic health impact...
EPA announced new stricter limits on diesel emissions, Bergen Record, 03/03/07
The smog and soot belched out by North Jersey trains and ferries could eventually be cut by nearly 90 percent under a tough new crackdown announced Friday by the Bush administration.With rainy Port Elizabeth as a backdrop, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency unveiled the new limits on diesel engine emissions, winning praise from both activists and business groups.
The EPA didn't provide a breakdown for northern New Jersey. But last year, an activist group estimated that soot pollution alone accounts for 100 deaths in Bergen County, 179 heart attacks and nearly 2,000 asthma attacks. In Passaic County, the pollution produces 46 deaths, 71 heart attacks and nearly 1,000 asthma attacks a year, the New Jersey Environmental Federation said...
Hazards of commuting hang heavy in N.J. air, Bergen Record, 03/01/07
As if commuting in New Jersey weren't bad enough, a national advocacy group says it can be downright hazardous to your health.Commuters in cars, trains and buses are exposed to high levels of diesel pollution -- breathing air that can contain four times to eight times more soot particles than the air in downtown areas, according to a study by the Clean Air Task Force.
It is comparable to driving in a closed car every day with a smoker. In fact, although people spend only 6 percent of their day commuting, they get up to 60 percent of their daily exposure to harmful ultrafine particles during that time, the study found.
Advocates say the new research points to the need for the state to step up its efforts to retrofit older buses, trucks, trains and tractors with cleaner-emission technologies.
"We have to commute in New Jersey so much more now -- greater distances, and not just into the city, but from suburb to suburb," said Kim Gaddy, environmental justice organizer for the New Jersey Environmental Federation. "That's a lot of time that we're spending in cars or on buses and trains breathing in these fumes."...
TV Broadcast: Newark City Council strikes down idling trucks to clean up air, News 12 NJ, 02/28/07
NEWARK - Newark is stepping up efforts to make sure a state law against idling trucks is enforced.Some residents say they suffer from health problems brought on by diesel pollution in the city. The Newark City Council voted to make the anti-idling state law a city law in the hopes of stepping up enforcement and cleaning up the air.
Advocates believe the state law will be more strictly enforced if it is also a local ordinance...
Radio Broadcast: WCBS 880, Pushing for Tighter Emissions Controls on Diesel Vehicles, 02/28/07
This radio clip features Amy Goldsmith, NJEF State Director.Environmentalists: "No Escaping Diesel Fumes in NJ", NJ 101.5, 03/01/07
Whether you live in the suburbs or the cities, you can't escape potentially deadly diesel fumes in New Jersey. That was the warning issued by environmental activists and State Assemblyman Bill Payne (D-Newark) at a news conference on the steps of Newark City Hall as dozens of diesel spewing trucks and buses rumbled by during midday traffic.The group New Jersey Environmental Federation pointed to a Clean Air TAsk Force report to call for the retrofitting of public trucks and buses, and all vehicles which do business with government agencies, with technology that would reduce diesel emissions.
"Whether you are in Bergen county, Camden county, any part of the state, you are breathing in diesel exhaust," said the Federation's state director Amy Goldsmith. "People are being bombarded in New Jersey, no matter what city or town they're in, because we are the major traffic and trade corridor of the east coast." ...
The New Jersey Environmental Federation (NJEF) and the East Orange Environmental Ambassadors announced the launching of their “Kids Clean Air Zones” campaign.“Our children and seniors in urban areas are disproportionately impacted by dirty diesel and suffer increasing rates of asthma and other respiratory and cardiac disease. Clearly not enough is being done to address this problem," said Kim Gaddy, NJEF Environmental Justice Organizer.
That’s why NJEF is here today with students from the Environmental Ambassadors Club, local elected officials, environmental justice activists and Board of Education representatives to say enough is enough and launch NJEF’s “Kids Clean Air Zones” campaign.
