Proceedings for the Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards Science and Policy Workshop
The last statutory periodic review of the air quality criteria and National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ozone (O3) and related photochemical oxidants was completed in 2020. In December 2020, the EPA issued its final decision to retain the existing O3 NAAQS without revision. In October 2021, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a reconsideration of the December 2020 decision. As part of the reconsideration, EPA established a Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) Ozone Review Panel, which provided advice to the EPA Administrator on science and policy documents through the CASAC. After carefully considering the CASAC’s advice, the Administrator announced a new review of the O3 NAAQS to ensure the standards reflect the most current, relevant science. EPA is incorporating the ongoing reconsideration into the new review of the O3 NAAQS and the underlying air quality criteria.
The new review of the O3 NAAQS and air quality criteria was announced in August 2023. As part of the planning phase of this review, the EPA held a virtual public workshop from May 13-16, 2024 to inform planning for the new review of the air quality criteria and the primary (health-based) and secondary (welfare-based) O3 NAAQS. This workshop provided EPA with an opportunity to receive input and advice on key science and policy issues for the review.
Participants invited to the workshop included experts internal and external to the EPA. These experts represented a variety of disciplines, including epidemiology; controlled human exposure studies; animal toxicology; ecology; statistics; biological, environmental, and physical sciences; atmospheric and climate science; human exposure science; and risk analysis. Workshop participants were invited to review several documents developed in the last review of the O3 NAAQS and from the reconsideration, and asked to highlight significant new and emerging policy-relevant research on O3 and related photochemical oxidants and to discuss how new evidence can build on the analyses and scientific findings from the last review of the O3 NAAQS,.
Workshop discussions will inform the development of planning and assessment documents intended to serve as the foundation for the Agency’s current review of the O3 NAAQS. These documents will include the Integrated Review Plan, which will highlight the key policy-relevant issues and summarize anticipated assessment approaches; the Integrated Science Assessment, which will summarize and assess the most policy-relevant scientific evidence and make key science judgments; and quantitative air quality, risk, and exposure analyses as warranted.
This document is intended to serve as a high-level summary of important topics discussed during the four day workshop and to document new, and potentially relevant research identified over the course of the workshop.