"The air across Iowa is so polluted that the state is perilously close to violating new federal limits aimed at protecting human health. Yet Iowans have no way of knowing what chemicals they are breathing because of a limited - and often inaccurate - system of monitoring pollution statewide, a Des Moines Register investigation found.

Catharine Fitzsimmons, Iowa's top air-quality official, defended Iowa's existing air-monitoring system. Yet she said the state is under orders from the federal government to better monitor fine-particle and ozone pollution, among Iowa's most pressing air-quality problems."

Perry Beeman and Chase Davis report for the Des Moines Register June 14, 2009. [2]