The California Air Resources Board on Thursday banned popular in-home ozone air purifiers, saying studies have found that they can worsen conditions such as asthma that marketers claim they help to prevent.
The regulation, which the board said is the first of its kind in the nation, will require testing and certification of all types of air purifiers. Any that emit more than a tiny amount of ozone will have to be pulled from the California market.
An estimated 2% of the state's households have one of the so-called ozone air purifiers, according to air board staff research, and the staff estimated that more than 500,000 people had been exposed to levels of ozone above federally recognized health standards as a result. More than 2 million California residents have some sort of air purifier, and other types can be safe and effective, the air board staff said.
"This is a landmark decision," said Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the Air Resources Board.
"State government needed to set up [its] own standards on air purifiers because many [marketers] indeed are deceiving the public," said former Assemblywoman Fran Pavley, who sponsored a law requiring the board to rein in so-called ozone generators. "There are reports of ozone being generated in someone's living room . . . at levels equivalent to having a Stage 1 smog alert right in your own house."
The new regulation, which takes effect in 2009, will exempt industrial and commercial uses of ozone generators, as long as people are not present.
The machines deliberately inject ozone into a living room or bedroom, or directly into nasal passages via a personal breathing device worn around the neck. They have been marketed on the radio and over the Internet for years under brand names such as Living Air Purifier, Mountain Air or Fresh Air.
The companies also employ direct marketing, in which salespeople who say they are satisfied consumers go door-to-door or advertise the products to friends and colleagues, then earn a commission for each unit sold.
Many direct marketers spoke at the air board's public hearing Thursday in Diamond Bar. Most, however, identified themselves not as salespeople but as consumers who said their own health, that of asthmatic children, their aging parents and even depressed pets had been dramatically improved after use of ozone purifiers sold by EcoQuest, a Tennessee-based company.
