Quote:
Originally Posted by Randy Rosenberg
Let's not forgot - it's all about the money...
The State gets Federal dollars, based on the condition that the State has a maximum of "X Number" of "Spare the Air" days. Those in Sacramento really want this money, so they look at many ways to promote clean air in order to help secure this Federal money. The State believes that Automobiles are the largest contributor to our "bad" air and are the easiest targets to legislate against. Given this, there's no way that the State is going to increase the number of annual Smog Exempt "Get Out of Jail Free" cards - they've given us 500 and they feel that we should be grateful that we have these 500. Any State Representative who presents a proposal to increase this number will probably risk re-election and committee appointments - so no one is gonna do this.
I'm interested to learn what Steve is reporting, when the facts are available...
Happy Motoring,
Randy...
|
Randy,
I read in the San Jose Mercury today that the Bay Area had exceeded the new (tougher) federal air quality guidelines 11 days this year. According to the article, under the old standard last year, the Bay Area would have only been in violation on one day. Fires also added two days to this year's totals.
Like you said, cars are the easy target, but there's no scientific evidence to back it up (i.e. Registering x number of hot rods per year driving an average of x miles per year will result in an increase of .000x% in smog levels).