Vermont has joined New York, eleven other states and the District of Columbia in suing the U.S. government over air pollution from smokestacks and exhaust pipes.
New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and his counterparts say the Environmental Protection Agency and the Bush administration are ignoring science and their own experts in refusing to slightly reduce the allowed threshold for soot emissions.
The states say lowering soot levels would save thousands of lives and reduce hospital admissions and public health costs.
California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, also are part of the lawsuit.