International Air Quality Advisory Board
SPECIAL REPORT ON
November 1998
INTRODUCTION While the involvement of the International Joint Commission (IJC) in air quality issues can be traced back to the Trail Smelter issue of the mid 1930s, the International Air Quality Advisory Board (IAQAB) was created in 1966 to provide advice to the Commission in fulfilling an air quality alerting function requested by governments in that year. The current membership of the Board is listed at the end of this report. This report is separated into ten major sections that consider a number of issues, some of which require immediate deliberation and possible action by the Commission. Other issues are more long-term in nature but will also likely require deliberation and possible action by the Commission. The major theme revisited by the Board in Section 1 is the need for both the United States and Canada to view transboundary air issues -- including current and future concerns regarding fine particulate matter, ozone, persistent toxic substances, visibility and acid rain -- under a "one atmosphere" or "seamless border" approach. Eliminating boundaries is crucial in any attempt to identify and understand the sources, transport, and transformation of pollutants that affect the health and welfare of people and ecosystems on either side of the border. Under a seamless border approach to transboundary pollution, both countries can address sources and receptors in a holistic manner, which should allow them to apply the most efficient control strategies and which should result in significant air quality improvement to the benefit of human health and ecosystems. A seamless border approach would also assist the countries and their agencies in examining issues where localized, regional or multi-regional benefits can result from reduction of the concentrations and/or emissions of specific types of pollutants. The Board has cited several examples of this in past reports and will do so in this report. The three subsequent sections are outgrowths of the seamless border concept. Section 2 discusses NOX as a key contaminant because of its direct impact on the ecosystem and because it affects future levels of other secondary pollutants. Section 3 outlines the deficiencies of emission inventories regarding persistent toxic substances (e.g. mercury), which must be addressed if source-to-receptor relationships are to be established. Section 4, Monitoring and Modeling, outlines the need to develop these tools to further examine pollutant transport and concentration, and the resulting human and ecological exposure. Section 5 describes issues in the individual regions along the boundary. Section 6 is directed at the harmonization of standards, which would assist in the effective control of transboundary pollutants such as ozone. Section 7, Collaboration with Other Organizations, discusses issues important to the IJC and a range of entities examining conditions in the transboundary airshed. Section 8, Surveillance, discusses various feedback mechanisms for verifying that the elimination or management of air pollution is achieving improvement and benefits for the United States and Canada. Section 9 considers emissions and preventative strategies for major source sectors, including coal-fired utilities and mobile sources. Two additional issues have been cited frequently in both the popular and scientific literature during the past decade: climate change and stratospheric ozone depletion. Although both issues could affect the quality of life and the general well-being of people in the transboundary region, ultimate response action is beyond the sole control of either the United States or Canada. While both nations will undoubtedly continue to interact with the world community to debate both issues and to seek responsive actions, the Board will limit its vigilance of these issues to discussing their linkage with issues open to greater regional control. Reporting bodies, such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, should be relied upon to provide thorough coverage of these issues. |