Monday, June 19, 2006

Appropriately named Smokies still thick with pollution

It's one of the saddest aspects of modern growth in the Southeast: the Great Smoky Mountains have a suffocating haze permanently atop, and, according to the Associated Press, it has "nothing to do with the natural mist for which the Cherokees named the region 'place of blue smoke.'"

The Smokies are the most visited national park in the nation, but it is "under attack from smokestack soot and smog, invaded by non-native pests and challenged by its own popularity. ...

"Millions of dollars in support in the past 10 years from such nonprofit groups as Friends of the Smokies and the Great Smoky Mountains Association and the contributions of thousands of volunteers to clear trails and build buildings gives them reason for hope."

Air pollution may be the Smokies' biggest challenge. Emissions from coal-fired power plants, industry and motorists hundreds of miles away or just over the next ridge is fouling the Smokies' skies, reducing 113-mile vistas to 25 miles, creating ground-level ozone that makes breathing difficult and drawing air-quality comparisons to Los Angeles.

"The good news is the future is now - here," said Jim Renfro, the Smokies air-quality specialist. "When you look at other plac-es throughout the country, some haven't gotten to the stage we are."

That stage was reached after the park established "irrefutable evidence" after 10 years of monitoring that air quality was bad and getting worse in the late 1990s.

The region's biggest polluter, the Tennessee Valley Authority stepped up a multibillion-dollar program to clean up its coal-fired power plants. In 2005, park and TVA officials announced that emissions were going down.

"We reversed the trend, which I think is a huge success story. Since the late '90s, air quality is improving, and it is expected to continue to improve over the next 10 years," Renfro said. "Is it enough to attain standards and protect the resources? We hope so."

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