FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, April 6, 2005

Chambliss, Isakson Announce EPA Removes
Muscogee County from Nonattainment List

WASHINGTON --   U.S. Senators Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., and Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., announced today that the Environmental Protection Agency has added Muscogee County to a list of counties that now meets the agency’s new air quality standards.  The senators said they have been working with the EPA on behalf of Muscogee County and the entire Columbus community.  

This week, the EPA announced Muscogee County now meets the nation’s new, more protective air quality standards for fine particle pollution (PM2.5). 

“Our success in having the EPA classify Muscogee County as in attainment can be credited to team work at the federal, state and local level,” said Chambliss.  “We all share the important goals of a cleaner, safer, and healthy environment.  At the same time, Muscogee County and the community of Columbus made an accurate case for being re-classified.”

 “We worked very hard with Muscogee County officials and the EPA to get this county on the list of those that meet federal air quality standards and I am very pleased to see that our efforts have paid off. This is a great result for Muscogee and for Georgia,”  Isakson said.

Specifically, the EPA designated Muscogee as a county in nonattainment in December 2004 based on 2001-2003 air quality data.  Following these designations, EPA provided an opportunity for states to submit updated, quality-assured, certified air quality data for 2002-2004.  After reviewing the 2002-2004 air quality monitoring data provided, EPA found that Muscogee County should be designated as “in attainment.” 

According to the EPA, fine particle pollution, also called PM2.5, is a mixture of microscopic solids and liquid droplets suspended in air.  Fine particles can be emitted directly (such as smoke from a fire) or formed in the atmosphere from power plant, industrial and mobile source emissions of gases such as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides.  These tiny particles can aggravate heart and lung diseases and have been associated with very serious health problems including heart attacks, chronic bronchitis and asthma attacks. 

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