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 Automobile Emissions Testing Technician's Syndrome

 By Thomas Crane

In an article that was published in the Kentucky Post Newspaper dated February 1, 2002, titled, "At E-check, an unwelcome sight,"  it stated, "State officials are investigating Northern Kentucky's vehicle emission testing centers after a motorist said employees offered to pass his car if he didn't tell authorities he had seen employees 'mooning' each other."  It went on to say that, "Steve Milburn of Envirotest said his company took swift action to immediately fire the employees."

In another article that was published by CIESIN, Center for International Earth Science Information Network, that bore no date of publication and was titled, "Methane Emissions From Livestock,"  it stated that,  "The domestic animal population has increased by 0.5 to 2.0 percent per day during the last century, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) .....One result of this population increase (referring to the domestic animal population - my insert) is that emissions from livestock have become a significant source of atmospheric methane.  In fact, domestic animals currently account for about 15 percent of the annual anthropogenic methane emissions."

As I read both of these articles, I began to wonder if the EPA might have, whether indirectly or directly, created something in the way of an obsession with emission products whether they be mechanical, animal, human or otherwise.  Now, I do not pretend to be an expert in such matters, but in the case of the Envirotest employees to say that maybe one or even two, but for three employees to be engaged in such deviant behavior appears to be rather extraordinary.  By performing emissions tests day in and day out maybe something of an obsession with end products began to grow in these men's minds; something in the way of a syndrome as the medical profession would no doubt classify it.  Rather than fire these men, perhaps they should have been subjected to psychological analysis in order to determine if the nature of their work might have had some direct influence on the manner in which they viewed the world.  To allow these men to go back on the streets without any concern as to what the long range affect their work might have had on them is open to question, don't you think?

In the case of the Methane Emission studies, we find that there seems to be some sort of obsession with the end products of animals.  Now, when it comes to scientific study,  I am no prude, but one has to wonder why someone would wish to engage in such studies.  The fact is, whenever I visited the farm when I was young, and we did so quite often, I was inclined to approach an animal from the front rather than from the rear.  The usual instinct was to pet the animal's head and perhaps offer it something to eat.  I was not inclined to examine what it was that the animal had already eaten unless, by accident, I stepped in it.  Whenever that happened, I would either yell or say something in anguish and immediately run for the nearest source of water in order to clean it off.  To do otherwise, would have provoked some reaction on the part of my parents as to what it was that I might be thinking.

In order that I might not offend anyone regarding the subject matter at hand, I think that I will end this discussion where it is and leave well enough alone.  My only comment being that maybe if some people had received proper training in their personal habits during their developmental years, we may have been spared an entire generation of people sniffing after us in order to determine what it was that we might have left behind.   As they sometimes say, "Take time and smell the roses."

Thomas Crane

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