WildEarth Guardians

Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Groups in Court Today to Argue for Cleaner Air in Utah's Uinta Basin

Public health at risk from EPA's failure to rein in ground-level ozone, booming fracking
Contact: Jeremy Nichols (303) 437-7663

Additional Contacts:

Robin Cooley, Attorney with Earthjustice, (303) 263-2472

Dr. Brian Moench, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, (801) 243-9089

Washington, D.C. — A coalition of public health and conservation groups today is pressing their case against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over the agency’s failure to protect Utah’s Uinta Basin from dangerous levels of smog pollution.

“Unchecked fracking has made the Uinta Basin home to some of the worst ground-level ozone pollution in the nation,” said Earthjustice attorney Robin Cooley, who is representing the groups in court. “It’s time for the EPA to stop stalling and start safeguarding our clean air and our health here in the west.”

At a court hearing scheduled for 9:30 AM before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, attorneys with Earthjustice, representing WildEarth Guardians, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, and Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, will lay out how the EPA violated the Clean Air Act by failing to designate the Uinta Basin as being in violation of federal health standards.

Such a designation would set a deadline for state and federal agencies to clean up the air in the region.

Ground-level ozone, the key ingredient of smog, has soared in the Uinta Basin in recent years.  Tied to the region’s explosion of fracking, smog levels have rivaled those usually found in Los Angeles and Houston.  Ozone levels above federal health standards have lately been recorded throughout the region, including in the town of Vernal and even in the northwestern Colorado town of Rangely.

Recent studies have confirmed the link between the region’s oil and gas development and its high ozone.  More than 11,000 oil and gas wells have been drilled in the region.  A recent study published in the journal, Environmental Science and Technology, reported that total ozone forming pollution from oil and gas operations in the region equals the amount released by 100 million passenger vehicles.

An audio transcript of today’s hearing will be posted on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals oral argument website by the end of the day.