Colorado already seeing ‘serious’ ozone violations in 2023, watchdogs say

BY MICHAEL BOOTH THE COLORADO SUN

Colorado’s Front Range has already recorded violations of federal ozone caps for 2023 that put the state into the “serious” pollution infraction category, and regulators should voluntarily call for EPA sanctions in order to speed up health-protecting fixes, environmental watchdogs said.

Readings at public ozone monitors show that the nine-county Front Range nonattainment area, already under EPA jurisdiction for past violations, has blown past the numbers that will trigger the EPA to move Colorado from the “moderate” to “severe” category for breaching 2015 standards. Admitting it now would speed up EPA-mandated corrections such as tighter controls on oil and gas drilling and other pollution permits, clean air advocates said.

Other major U.S. cities that were in similar ozone violations have since come into compliance and been declared in attainment of the tighter 2015 standard, said Robert Ukeiley, a Denver air pollution attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity.

“It’s pretty sad when Denver is more polluted than places like Detroit, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and Atlanta, all to protect the short-term profits of the big oil companies which make up a very small percentage of Colorado’s economy,” Ukeiley said.

Colorado air pollution regulators responded they are “evaluating” the idea of asking the EPA for a voluntary reclassification before the federal agency’s rules require a reevaluation of nonattainment in 2024.

Meanwhile, said Air Pollution Control Division spokesperson Leah Schleifer, “we aren’t waiting for a potential U.S. EPA reclassification as we move forward with actions to reduce ground-level ozone pollution. Colorado is taking bold and meaningful steps right now.”

Those steps, the division said, include acting on Gov. Jared Polis’ recent directive to reduce nitrogen oxide releases from oil and gas production, and implementing new clean truck and car rules to speed replacement of fossil fuels with lower emissions electric motors.

Those assurances are not meaningful, Ukeiley responded, after years of the division and the Air Quality Control Commission moving slowly on new pollution rules and delaying EPA enforcement. The EPA has repeatedly downgraded the northern Front Range ozone problem under both 2008 caps of 75 parts per billion and the tighter 2015 cap of 70 parts per billion.

“As a general rule, reasonable people don’t believe a six-time loser when they say they are trying really hard not to fail a seventh time,” Ukeiley said. “If they were actually working hard to protect air quality for all Coloradans, they would have already submitted their voluntary downgrade