‘Life-saving’: EPA tightens US pollution controls on soot

Environmental Protection Agency sets lower limits on fine particle pollution, estimated to cause 85,000 to 225,000 deaths annually

The Environmental Protection Agency has finalized long-awaited new limits on soot, the tiny air pollution particles emitted by sources as varied as power plants, factories, car exhaust and wildfires.

Today's action is a critical step forward that will better protect workers, families and communities from the dangerous and costly impacts of fine particle pollution," the EPA administrator, Michael Regan, told reporters on Tuesday.