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May 6, 2008 8:45 pm US/Mountain
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Tailpipe Tests Tightened To Control Auto Pollution
Reporting
Paul Day
DENVER (CBS4) ―
Colorado toughened its tailpipe emission tests starting this week and tens of thousands of additional cars are expected to flunk in the upcoming year.
"There will be more dirty cars failed; that's the point," said Gary Kaufman, head of Mobile Sources for the State Air Pollution Control Division.
An estimated 775,000 vehicles undergo biannual testing at Air Care Colorado Stations in the seven county Denver metro area.
Previously, only 3 percent of the cars tested did not pass. Now it's expected the failure rate will climb to 7 percent resulting in some 31,000 additional cars which will flunk.
Jeanne Labuda was waiting in line to have her 12-year-old Ford Taurus tested at the station at 2300 South Lipan.
"We're now getting close to the end of the session, so I finally have time to break in the middle of the week and come down here," said Labuda, a state representative from Denver. "So if I flunk, I'm going to be very, very upset."
The new, tougher tailpipe tests are designed to help reduce the sources of a harmful pollutant called "ground-level ozone."
"The more we study ozone, the more we understand it's a very dangerous pollutant," Kaufman said.
The Denver metro area is currently out of compliance with federal ozone standards.
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