FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 14, 2007

First Ozone Alert issued for Kansas City region

Higher temperatures bring higher concentrations of harmful pollutant

KANSAS CITY, Mo. —The Mid-America Regional Council (MARC) has issued an Ozone Alert for Friday, June 15, for the Kansas City metropolitan area. Ground-level ozone concentrations are expected to be in the “orange alert” category. This alert indicates that tomorrow’s expected combination of polluting emissions and hot, sunny weather will put the region at risk for developing high concentrations of ground-level ozone pollution — which means potentially unhealthy air quality throughout the region.

Exposure to ozone pollution can be especially dangerous to children and to anyone who suffers from bronchitis, heart disease, emphysema, asthma, or other cardiovascular or respiratory problems. Ozone pollution can also cause a variety of problems in healthy people, including chest pains, coughing, nausea, throat irritation and difficulty breathing. People who work or exercise outdoors — or even those who spend a lot of time outdoors — may also be affected.

To avoid unhealthy exposure to ground-level ozone pollution tomorrow, area residents should limit vigorous outdoor activities to the morning or evening hours — before 10:00 a.m. or after 7:00 p.m. — and avoid prolonged periods of outdoor exertion.

MARC’s daily SkyCasts help area residents plan outdoor activities by forecasting the next day’s ozone concentrations:

• “Green” SkyCast indicates good air quality.
• “Yellow” indicates moderate ozone concentrations with some increased health risk for particularly
  sensitive people.
•   “Orange” indicates an Ozone Alert with unhealthy air quality for sensitive groups. Children and people with respiratory or cardiovascular problems should cut back or reschedule strenuous outside activities.
• “Red” indicates an Ozone Alert day with unhealthy air quality. Everyone should cut back or reschedule strenuous outside activity, and sensitive people should avoid it altogether.

SkyCasts are available daily on the MARC Web site (www.marc.org), by calling the air quality information line at (913) 383-7557, and via many area media outlets.

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