Like the gasoline motorists pump into their vehicles, Utah's air is unleaded. It has been for the past three decades.
But, to prove that to federal regulators, the state Department of Environmental Quality will have to expand its network of lead monitors the next few years to collect data at key locations, a task that could cost an estimated $100,000.
Showing the low lead levels in Utah's air comes when federal regulators are looking to crack down on lead emissions, a process that ended in 1986 with the phaseout of leaded gas.
Even small lead levels can affect intelligence, learning, memory and behavior in children.
"The old standard wasn't good enough to protect based on what we know today," said Bruce Allen of the Utah Division of Air Quality.
It also comes when Utah's budget is strapped, facing an overall shortfall of about $850 million and about $2.3 million in at least one key environmental fund.
"These funds are not going to come from the [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency]," Allen told the state Air Quality Board recently. "They are going to have to come from our budget."
Under tighter standards originated during the Bush administration, lead concentrations must be lower than 0.15 microgram per cubic meter of air over a running three-year average. The old standard, set in 1978, allowed 10 times as much airborne lead.
Utah did not violate the old standard in those 23 years and stopped monitoring for the pollutant four years ago.
In fact, for nearly two decades before the lead monitoring was abandoned, readings were well below the levels now in place for the tougher new standard -- even at places like Rio Tinto's smelter and refinery.
Despite these past observations, Utah must gather current information for the EPA, which has set an initial deadline of 2011 for providing updated air-lead data.
