The EPA announced Monday that it isn’t changing federal air quality standards for airborne particle pollution, despite the recommendations of the agency’s own staff and public health officials to make them more stringent.
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Andrew Wheeler said the decision came after consultation with the agency’s independent scientific advisers, the consideration of more than 60,000 public comments, and five public meetings.
The Obama administration set the current standards in 2012 at 12 micrograms per cubic meter for airborne particle pollution, including soot, which is released from fossil fuel combustion and linked to cardiac and respiratory illnesses. ...