Ari Weitzman
speaker
1,840 appearances
13 recordings
1 series
first heard Aug 2026
last heard 5d ago
Ari Weitzman’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 13 in all, peaking in Sep 2026 with 11.
Appearances
My group was helping gather and prepare members of the public to testify against the EPA's proposed change to its standard for ozone, a gas that is very helpful in the stratosphere, where it protects us from ultraviolet rays, but is classified as a pollutant in the troposphere, where it can burn our lungs and airways when we breathe it in.
The EPA's existing safety standard for ozone was point zero eight parts per million or PPM.
Ahead of its two thousand eight regulatory review, researchers at the EPA had determined a safe concentration for ozone was zero six parts per million, or at least no higher than zero seven.
The EPA, however, determined that their NAAQS standard for ozone would be 0.075, stricter than the existing standard, but more lenient than the latest recommendations of their experts.
I learned an important lesson for my time preparing testimony before the EPA.
Environmental policy is never straightforward.
The people who testified were straightforward, they were informed and they were earnest about their opinions.
They had chronic emphysema or children with asthma and poor air quality wouldn't endanger their health.
They took the time to prepare and they put some moving testimony in front of the review board.
Then, after the session ended, my manager from the nonprofit pulled me into a surprisingly congenial discussion with a person at the EPA.
And in that discussion, I discovered that the Chicago city government had already lobbied the EPA for this more lenient standard.
There's no way the metropolitan region can meet the point zero seven proposed threshold.
And if it was classified as non attainment, then the city's federal funds for transportation projects, including public transit, would be impacted.
The upshot was that the stricter standard would make public transit harder to fund, meaning more people traveling by car, meaning worse air quality for the metropolitan area.
It turned out that the best thing for Chicago's air quality was actually for the EPA to impose a looser standard, the exact opposite of the thing I organized citizens to lobby for.
In two thousand eight.
I was an idealist who didn't realize he'd been cast for a role in a play.
Now, in twenty twenty six, I have the immense privilege of sitting in the audience and penning a review.
So let's take this issue head on.
Carmon dioxide, or CO two, is not classified as a pollutant under the EPA's NAAQS.
Showing 241–260 of 1,840 · page 13 of 92
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