So far, that money has paid few dividends. Battling technical glitches that left some drivers waiting in line for two hours or more, Envirotest and state officials were already losing the battle for public support when talk-show host Peter Boyles of KTLK-AM arranged to send through the emissions test three cars that had been set up to fail. All three of the vehicles were given passing grades on the supposedly more rigorous and sophisticated I/M 240 test. After Boyles put his findings on the air, state officials were forced to reveal that they had been using a standard four times lower than that of the old tailpipe idle test--an intentional effort to mollify car owners peeved by the new program. The red-faced officials explained the program was in a "phase-in" period, during which standards would gradually be toughened.
Boyles's ploy still has Envirotest fuming. Spokesman Joe McKeon calls the incident "an outrage" and claims Envirotest personnel saw Boyles's mechanic disable one vehicle after it passed the emissions test. "I've listened to his show, and there's not a shred of truth in anything Peter Boyles says about the program," McKeon says. Boyles says he stands by his investigation. "The old test caught those cars," says the talk-show host. "Mr. McKeon's test did not. How am I a liar?"
Critics of centralized testing say there are other far cheaper and more efficient systems for monitoring auto exhaust. The choice of many who resent the EPA's preferred program is "remote sensing," a system invented at the University of Denver that uses an infrared beam to measure levels of carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides in the tailpipe exhaust of vehicles passing by a roadside station.
"There's far more hard data concerning the merits of remote sensing as a method of cleaning the air than there is for centralized testing," says Glendale mayor Steve Ward, who has served on the Regional Air Quality Council and who formerly headed the governor's Alternative Fuels Task Force. Ward cites research comparing carbon-monoxide reductions in metro areas across the country. Areas where centralized testing was used showed no greater reductions than areas without such testing.
DU chemistry professor Donald Stedman, who developed remote sensing with research scientist Gary Bishop, says the equipment can accurately analyze emissions at a cost of 50 cents per vehicle. Detractors maintain that the device is prone to mistakes due to wind currents, the proximity of vehicles to one another on the road, whether the car is still cold from a recent start, and other variables.
The federal Clean Air Act of 1990, however, mandates that Colorado at least study the viability of remote sensing. One study will begin in the metro area this year, says Michael O'Toole of the state health department's air quality control division. Another will gear up in Greeley in 1996.
If those studies point to remote sensing as the wave of the future in emissions testing, Envirotest won't complain too loudly. Chester Davenport's company acquired the rights to Stedman and Bishop's technology last year.
