Overview

What's Drive Clean Across Texas all about?

Drive Clean Across Texas is the nation's first statewide public outreach and education campaign designed to raise awareness and change attitudes about air pollution. Ultimately Drive Clean Across Texas' goal is to inspire changes in driving behavior that will help clean up the air in Texas. Although there are many sources of air pollution, one of the major contributors is vehicle emissions from our cars and trucks. Therefore, Drive Clean Across Texas focuses on reducing this source of pollution.

Air Pollution and Health

Air pollution is a serious problem. It requires our commitment to reducing it because it can affect our health. Children, the elderly, those with respiratory illness and those who work and exercise outdoors are at highest risk of developing medical complications caused by air pollution.

Exposure to air pollution can lead to:

  • Coughing
  • Throat irritation
  • Pain when breathing
  • Reduced lung function
  • Inflammation of lung lining

Ground-level ozone will actually give healthy people the equivalent of sunburn on their lungs!

Long-term exposure to air pollution can cause:

  • Lowered immunity
  • Cancer
  • And in extreme cases, death

Texas has only a few years to meet the Federal Clean Air Act standards imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency. If we fail, the consequences are serious and far reaching. Air pollution can do more than restrict our breathing; it can also inhibit our mobility and cripple our economy.

Nine Texas Areas Do Not Meet Clean Air Quality Standards

There are nine areas of Texas that do not meet or barely meet Federal Clean Air Quality Standards. They are designated as non attainment (not meeting Federal Clean Air Quality Standards), near non-attainment (barely meeting standards) or Early Action Compact (EAC) (not meeting standards and have pledged to meet standards earlier than required by the Clean Air Act). These areas are as follows:

Texas map showing non-attainment, near non-attainment, and early action compact areas

Non-attainment areas are:

  • Houston/Galveston
  • Dallas/Fort Worth
  • Beaumont/Port Arthur
  • El Paso

Near non-attainment areas:

  • Victoria
  • Corpus Christi

Early Action Compact areas:

  • San Antonio
  • Austin
  • Tyler/Longview

What Can Texas Do to Improve Air Quality

Each of us is part of the solution to this urgent problem in Texas. There are five primary actions that individuals can take. For more information on these actions, go to Do Your Part.

  • Maintain your vehicle
  • Drive Less
  • Buy a "cleaner" vehicle
  • Drive the speed limit
  • Reduce idling

Consequences

  • If we don't clean up the air, we could lose billions in federal highway funding, and traffic congestion problems will grow worse.
  • If we don't clean up the air, the costs of treating lung disease — the fastest-growing cause of death in the U.S. — will grow higher than ever.
  • If we don't clean up the air, these health and mobility challenges will limit our efforts to bring new business to Texas and ensure our continued prosperity.

Campaign Efforts

The Drive Clean Across Texas campaign consists of three components with activities and products designed to meet these goals:

  • public outreach,
  • media relations, and
  • public education.

Public outreach

The campaign includes a mix of radio, television and billboard messages airing in the summer months in Texas' nine non-attainment and near non-attainment areas. Collectively, the public outreach messages are designed to state the problem, establish a link between traffic and air pollution, and communicate specifically what Texans can do to reduce vehicle-related air pollution.

Media relations

Air quality affects the everyday lives of Texans. For that reason, it's an important and relevant news topic. The Drive Clean Across Texas campaign also communicates a wide range of important information through the news media in the form of news stories and public service announcements.

Public education

Drive Clean Across Texas has also developed a variety of materials to help reinforce public outreach and news coverage and to communicate more detailed information about Texas' air quality problem. The following materials are available: