At a hearing organized by the North Texas Clean Air Task Force, Dallas-area State Rep. Carol Kent, spoke out in favor of proposed new EPA standards on ozone emissions.

The hearing featured Dr. Al Armendariz, the new Region Six EPA Administrator, who testified regarding the EPA’s proposal to limit ozone pollution standards to 60 molecules of ozone per billion molecules, from the current standard of 75 parts per billion.

“Ozone has repeatedly been shown to cause health problems for our community, including asthma attacks, chest pain, and even premature death,” said Rep. Kent, who previously spoke out in favor of tougher emissions standards for cement kilns in Texas. “Curtailing health threats is enough reason in itself to support these standards. But we also found that people prefer to move into communities with clean air; that businesses tend to move to areas where air quality is better and potential employees want to move; and that our public health spending is lower when residents don’t become sick from breathing dirty air. Clean air is good for Texas business, and Texas business ought to be good to clean air,” she added.

Her remarks were echoed by other individuals at the hearing, concerned about the health risks caused by ozone pollution, and come on the heels of a Cook Children’s Hospital study that shows North Texas children, between the ages of eight and nine, are three times more likely to have asthma than in the state at large.