Cost of cleaning up smog exceeds benefits, experts claim

Oil industry experts in the US have claimed that the cost of cleaning up smog exceeds any health benefits it may provide.

In a new report, the American Petroleum Institute accused the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of tweaking its analysis in order to increase the health benefits resulting from tougher rules on ground-level ozone.

The American Petroleum Institute compiled the report in order to add weight to its argument that stricter limits on ground-level ozone should be prevented from coming into force by president Barrack Obama.

"Ozone background levels may rise as high 0.04 ppm so that much of the change that EPA is assuming in those low ozone concentrations could not even occur. If those assumed changes cannot occur most of the estimated ozone exposure changes could not occur and almost all of EPA's ozone benefits estimates would not occur," the report argued.

In July 2010, the EPA proposed some of the strictest health standards to date for smog.