Putting Houston's Air Quality in Context

The Federal Government has established six National Ambient Air Quality Standards. Houston's air meets five of the six NAAQS. The one standard that Houston is still working to attain is ground-level ozone. For more information about the NAAQS, visit the EPA's website: http://www.epa.gov/air/criteria.html

The quality of Houston's air compares favorably with other cities when looking at all the NAAQS. According to EPA data, Los Angeles, Phoenix, New York, Pittsburgh, El Paso, Chicago, Washington D.C., Detroit-Ann Arbor, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City and St. Louis fail to meet two or more of the NAAQS.

Through concerted effort and investment, Houston has achieved an 80 percent reduction in key Volatile Organic Compounds in the past 15 years. While great strides have been made, industry have invested between $4 and 6 billion by 2008 to make further improvements in air quality. This investment is in addition to the substantial investment made in the 1990s.

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Effects Screening Levels

• ESLs are established by TCEQ based on data concerning health effects, odor, nuisance potential, vegetation impacts, and corrosion effects
• ESLs are not ambient air standards, but are primarily used by TCEQ in evaluating applications for air permits
• Concentrations at or below the ESLs indicate no adverse health or welfare effects are expected
• Concentrations above the ESLs do not necessarily indicate a health effects problem, but trigger a more in-depth permit review

• Almost all monitored VOCs are below their annual ESL; most are a small fraction of their annual ESL
• The one exception is the level of benezene at two monitoring sites. Across the network, more than 99 percent of the benzene readings are below the 24-hour ESL. Overall, benzene levels have decreased more than 80 percent over the past 15 years
• Benzene levels in Houston are comparable to other US cities

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Our Mission Going Forward:
Maintaining and Improving Air Quality

Our on-going mission is to provide data to member companies to enable them to meet state and federal air standards. By using HRM data, our member companies can identify air control improvement projects.

Our member companies are working with the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality to take advantage of HRM member companies working with TCEQ the Environmental Monitoring and Response System (EMRS) pilot program. This voluntary effort began in June 2004. Through the pilot, we're testing a web-based notification system that allows real time response to high ambient Highly Reactive VOCs levels. HRM is funding three of the seven monitors and the industry notification system

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