Back to back ozone alert days

[Double A]

quote:Originally posted by YoungTulsan

It seems to me, that the reality of "Ozone Alerts" and what our air measures at, is about 99.9% weather, and 0.1% people refraining from cutting the weeds.

A freaking weed eater is going to make a difference?  We pollute the same amount every day.  Every day there are airplanes, helicopters, thousands of semi-trucks, two refineries, a power plant, and plenty of gas pumping at the local QTs.  Not buying gas at a certain time because of "pollution" is just as foolish as those chain e-mail letters about "Boycott gas on the 12th, we can cost Exxon $10 billion if we all work together!!1" - Because you are still going to fill up your tank.  You will be polluting the same.   The Ozone alert system is pretty much saying "pollute more at night, instead" or "pollute more next week".

But it is the WEATHER that usually does a good job of blowing our pollution away, and every now and then stagnates allowing us to breath in our own pollution.

I think Double A's point, while he may come off as hostile against the whole establishment, is simply that if we REALLY want to deal with the problem of POLLUTION, we should actually address the core of the problem.  Telling people not to use a weed-eater makes people FEEL like they are doing something.  So Joe Citizen now has a yard looking like squalor, while BillyBob the truck driver continues driving his big-rig across town, the refinery finds new and clever ways to dispose of toxic waste under our noses, and news helicopters fly around just for the hell of it.

I'm adding to that point my own, that pollution on a windy fall or spring day is the exact same pollution as on a stagnant summer day.  Why not hold every day of the year to the same standard, instead of suddenly thinking we have a problem because of the weather?

                                            And passing the buck on to our children. This has to end with our generation. We shouldn't repeat the same mistakes and continue the same habitual dysfunction of our parents. We will be the ones who will have to deal with problems our parents lacked the courage or conviction to resolve. We must spare our children from having  to face these issues by acting to provide real, long term solutions. They deserve better parents than ours and we have absolutely no excuse not to be.

[waterboy]

quote:Originally posted by Double A

quote:Originally posted by YoungTulsan

It seems to me, that the reality of "Ozone Alerts" and what our air measures at, is about 99.9% weather, and 0.1% people refraining from cutting the weeds.

A freaking weed eater is going to make a difference?  We pollute the same amount every day.  Every day there are airplanes, helicopters, thousands of semi-trucks, two refineries, a power plant, and plenty of gas pumping at the local QTs.  Not buying gas at a certain time because of "pollution" is just as foolish as those chain e-mail letters about "Boycott gas on the 12th, we can cost Exxon $10 billion if we all work together!!1" - Because you are still going to fill up your tank.  You will be polluting the same.   The Ozone alert system is pretty much saying "pollute more at night, instead" or "pollute more next week".

But it is the WEATHER that usually does a good job of blowing our pollution away, and every now and then stagnates allowing us to breath in our own pollution.

I think Double A's point, while he may come off as hostile against the whole establishment, is simply that if we REALLY want to deal with the problem of POLLUTION, we should actually address the core of the problem.  Telling people not to use a weed-eater makes people FEEL like they are doing something.  So Joe Citizen now has a yard looking like squalor, while BillyBob the truck driver continues driving his big-rig across town, the refinery finds new and clever ways to dispose of toxic waste under our noses, and news helicopters fly around just for the hell of it.

I'm adding to that point my own, that pollution on a windy fall or spring day is the exact same pollution as on a stagnant summer day.  Why not hold every day of the year to the same standard, instead of suddenly thinking we have a problem because of the weather?

                                            And passing the buck on to our children. This has to end with our generation. We shouldn't repeat the same mistakes and continue the same habitual dysfunction of our parents. We will be the ones who will have to deal with problems our parents lacked the courage or conviction to resolve. We must spare our children from having  to face these issues by acting to provide real, long term solutions. They deserve better parents than ours and we have absolutely no excuse not to be.

Help me! I've time warped back to the 60's and I can't find reality....

[waterboy]

Let me elaborate on that. Your bad parents were the generation that said the same thing you are saying, only 40 years ago. We conceived and started Earth Day. We were responsible for scads of environmental laws that forced polluters to clean up after themselves. We forced communities to clean up rivers that once caught fire. My wife and I refused to buy colored toilet paper in the 70's because the dye polluted the waters. We championed mass transit, geo-thermal, wind power, auto mileage standards, forestry reform, and on, and on. Where and when do you think the EPA evolved?

And we faced hostile parents who paid for our education by working for the corporations we so hated. Nonetheless, countless laws and practices were changed for the better. And this is the thanks we get?

The battle will always be there when corporations with little or no conscience follow the money so buck up and continue the fight. But for heavens sake don't turn on your best assets in the fight.

[rwarn17588]

Adding to what waterboy said, I'm old enough to remember when pollution was REALLY bad during the late 1960s and a good chunk of the 1970s.

Littering was far worse than it is now, Lake Erie was so polluted that it was considered a "dead" lake, and a brownish haze could be seen over most major cities at *any* time of the year, not just during hot days.

Within just a few years after those EPA rules, things had improved dramatically. We have a ways to go, but it sure beats 35 years ago.

Those who complain about pollution now are too young to remember how bad it truly was, or have poor memories.

I'm doing my part with solar panels, Energy Star appliances, a manual reel mower, and a low-emissions car. And I aim to do even more.

What are you doing, Double A?

[RecycleMichael]

quote:Originally posted by YoungTulsan

It seems to me, that the reality of "Ozone Alerts" and what our air measures at, is about 99.9% weather, and 0.1% people refraining from cutting the weeds.

A freaking weed eater is going to make a difference?  We pollute the same amount every day.  Every day there are airplanes, helicopters, thousands of semi-trucks, two refineries, a power plant, and plenty of gas pumping at the local QTs.  Not buying gas at a certain time because of "pollution" is just as foolish as those chain e-mail letters about "Boycott gas on the 12th, we can cost Exxon $10 billion if we all work together!!1" - Because you are still going to fill up your tank.  You will be polluting the same.   The Ozone alert system is pretty much saying "pollute more at night, instead" or "pollute more next week".

I will try to address these...thanks for asking, it gives me a chance to keep going...

You are correct that weather is the biggest factor. Tulsa sits in a little valley and we usually get some stretch of summer when the wind just stops. Some cities have more consistent summer wind (it is always windy in Oklahoma City...insert your own political joke here). But just because we can't change the weather doesn't mean we should not try to cause pollution.

One out of five kids in America suffer from asthma and are especially susceptable to ozone. If my simple actions of avoiding extra drivimg miles or buying gas at night instead of morning can help thousands and thousands of kids in Tulsa breathe better, sign me up to care.

That is why we do it. For us. I want to live in a healthy community. What list some federal government agency says we are on is not my only motivating factor.

Yes, a weed eater makes a difference. The small lawn maintenence items have no pollution control equipment. One hour of a mower or weed eater is the same as ten or twelve hours of driving the average car. This means that two hours of mowing and weedeating emissions are equivalent of 100 of us driving cars for a ten minute trip.

Yes, we are saying "pollute more at night", even though that probably won't be a slogan that we will use in our campaign. Air pollution dissipates over time and overnight hours mean less people are out and exposed.

But also ozone is a very unique kind of pollution that is formed by a reaction of sunlight and two types of gas. VOCs and NOX blend like a cake recipe and then create ozone only when they are cooked by heat and sunlight. Ozone levels are very easy to track and they are always highest from lunch till dinner, the times when the sun is high in the sky.

If we have clouds, we have lower ozone levels. If we have wind, we have lower ozone leverls. If we have rain, we wash out the pollutants in the air and we have very low levels of ozone.

Finally, my political commentary...

One of the reasons I react so strongly to fools like doubleA is that they all act like the world is too far gone and we should run around screaming. He should trade names with Chicken Little and say "the sky is falling!"

We have made tremendous strides in America (and in Tulsa) and the air is cleaner than ever before. The ozone levels in Tulsa were sometimes in the high .150s for 8 hours and now we have 8 hour averages that exceed .090 only a couple of times a year.

Our air continues to get cleaner and it is because our campaign is working. It involves all the things that doublea distrusts, like elected officials, media, and private industries like the refineries. Thousands of us do change our lives slightly on the few days a summer when the DEQ calls an ozone alert day. Together we make a difference.

[Double A]

I am nobody's fool, especially yours, spincycle. You might be fooling others, but you aren't fooling me. I won't co-sign the B.S. spin. Try to play me for the fool, but I ain't tha one.

[Double A]

quote:Originally posted by waterboy

Let me elaborate on that. Your bad parents were the generation that said the same thing you are saying, only 40 years ago. We conceived and started Earth Day. We were responsible for scads of environmental laws that forced polluters to clean up after themselves. We forced communities to clean up rivers that once caught fire. My wife and I refused to buy colored toilet paper in the 70's because the dye polluted the waters. We championed mass transit, geo-thermal, wind power, auto mileage standards, forestry reform, and on, and on. Where and when do you think the EPA evolved?

And we faced hostile parents who paid for our education by working for the corporations we so hated. Nonetheless, countless laws and practices were changed for the better. And this is the thanks we get?

The battle will always be there when corporations with little or no conscience follow the money so buck up and continue the fight. But for heavens sake don't turn on your best assets in the fight.

I do realize that, but I think it further illustrates the point that we don't really have any of those things on a widespread, affordable or accessible scale. Nonetheless, countless laws and practices that have been changed for the better, have been changed for the worst in the past 8 years by a president your generation elected, not mine. Your generation gave Bush the White House and my generation(don't forget the Y's either) the Iraq war to fight, not mine. With assets like that, who needs liabilities? All I am saying is that my generation has to do a better job than this.

[waterboy]

Would you happen to have a breakdown by age and demographic of who voted for this bumpkin? You might be surprised at how conservative the young have become. I refuse to believe that my generation alone (over 50) is responsible for Bush and dang sure not Iraq. Most of us knew better than to create another Viet Nam. Many of us actually believe we elected Gore then Kerry and were screwed by the under 45 yr old techs at Diebold. But at least we voted. It was a close race and those who didn't vote deserve the blame, not me.

Churchill: "Anyone who isn't a liberal as a young man has no heart. Anyone who isn't a conservative as an old man has no brain." We did our part when we were young to start the wheels of environmental/societal change and inevitably age and wealth beset us. But what can you say about an under 40 now who sports bumper stickers that say, "The President"?

[inteller]

tulsa is in a valley?  as compared to what, kansas?

[Hoss]

quote:Originally posted by recyclemichael

I realize that you just "hate the establishment" and use this forum like a urinal.

We get it.

You have no clue about real facts and write and speak incorrect innuendos and anger as a tool to act like a rebel.

We get it.

You would rather call people names and make speeches to anyone who has a camera and a microphone. It is all about you.

We get it.

Tulsa has been off the dirty air list for every year since we have had an organized air quality education committee. The larger communities around us...Dallas, Kansas City, Houston, Denver and even smaller communities like Longview have all failed and now on the dirty air list. Tulsa has a program that almost every other community wants. The EPA calls our program the best voluntary program in the country and has entered into contracts with us pledging to do everything they can to keep us off if we fail.

Tulsa was even given a special status a few years ago calling us a "Flexible Attainment Region". They admitted that we did better than anyone else and if we failed, it was impossible for anyone in our situation to succeed.

The standards will probably continue to become more strict and there may be a day where they set a standard that we cannot meet. But I am going to do all I can before then to convince everybody else in town to act those few days a year where it really matters.

They get it.

It's not just that we have what other polluters want; Tulsa was the very first city in the nation to have a plan like Ozone Alert days.  Ours is the model plan from what I understand.

Much like we had the model plan for flood management after the 1984 Memorial Day flood.

[YoungTulsan]

quote:Originally posted by inteller



tulsa is in a valley?  as compared to what, kansas?

The reason we have a river running through the city is because the land slopes down from points around it, to where it flows.

[rwarn17588]

^ Yup.

Apparently the basics of topography have escaped inteller's grasp.