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Missouri, Illinois To Recommend Pollution Zones

By Kevin Lavery, KWMU

St. Louis, MO – Officials will recommend that the city of St. Louis, four Missouri counties and perhaps as many as five Metro East counties be listed as having a high degree of fine particle emissions. Fine particulates include chemicals such as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide. The Missouri Department of Natural Resources' Leanne Tippett says she's working with other states to pinpoint the problem:

"We've not yet started trying to determine what the control strategies are that we will be using," Tippett said. "We're just still doing some of the scientific background work in order to make the best possible decisions.

Illinois is still finalizing its list of high pollution regions. The Illinois EPA's Dave Kolaz says reducing sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions will help reduce particulate pollution but not eliminate it entirely:

Some people are pointing to these as being the cure for the fine particulate problems but that won't be the case," Kolaz said. "It's going to be combination of control strategies that ultimately bring this area into attainment of that standard.

The EPA will decide on the matter in December.

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