Clean Air Act

The United States, as can easily be imagined, experiences more side effects of global warming than anywhere else in the world. This may be explained by the increasingly large amount of greenhouse gases we emit each day, and our reliance on motor vehicles. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, the number of registered vehicles has more than tripled since 1960; therefore, the amount of exhaust emission coming from registered vehicles alone, has more than tripled. This obviously poses a threat to our environment.

The Clean Air Act, updated in 1990 from its original 1970 version, is an act passed by the American government to "clean up air pollution." The act works to reduce the amount of air pollution created by vehicles and other sources of pollution, and reduce the amount of chemicals used that deplete the ozone. The goal of the act was to "set and achieve" National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for each state, and a maximum pollutant level would be set accordingly for each state. Many states were not proactive in establishing NAAQS, and missed the deadlines set by the Act. There have been revisions since the original version, so the Act has not been completely ignored.

For a proposal with so much potential for beneficial effects, it is a shame that it could not be acted upon as planned because the state governments were so careless as to miss the NAAQS deadlines. The original version of this Act, if enforced as it should have been, would have greatly reduced the amount of greenhouse gas emissions produced by each state. Furthermore, since the NAAQS was created for each state instead of the country as a whole, each state's industry and economy would not be put in jeopardy because they were taken into careful consideration when establishing an appropriate NAAQS. This would have been a very effective bill, and it is a shame that the American people are unmotivated to the point of carelessness.