The symptoms tell the Greensboro physician that ozone season has descended on the Piedmont.

It's a period, usually running from late May to mid-September, when ground-level ozone pollution often reaches unhealthy levels.

The colorless gas is formed when still, hot conditions cause emissions from power plants, vehicles and other fossil-fuel burners to react with the atmosphere.

Now, a coalition of 11 counties and 20 cities and towns in the Piedmont Triad has taken steps to reduce the severity and impact of that pollution.

A panel of local government, environmental, transportation and business officials has spent months developing a plan to cut ozone levels and bring the region into compliance with federal regulations.

The group submitted its final plan, called an Early Action Compact, to the state Thursday and will send it to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency later this month.

If approved, it will allow the region to delay until 2007 stringent federal regulations that could mire new industries in red- tape and require them to install expensive pollution controls.

To cut ozone in the next two years and beyond, the plan proposes a broad swath of actions.

In 28 pages, it outlines initiatives ranging from building sidewalks and greenways to reducing fleet vehicle emissions and increasing bus ridership to promoting energy-efficient building design.

The largest cuts will come through two statewide initiatives: an expanded vehicle inspection and maintenance program and an open burning ban during ozone season.

Some of the actions are mandated by ordinances, but most are voluntary.

"When you get right down to it, there just aren't too many enforceable things we can do here in the Triad," said Ginger Booker, assistant director of the Piedmont Triad Council of Governments who drafted much of the compact.

That ambiguity was a sticking point for months for the Southern Environmental Law Center, which threatened to sue if the plan wasn't strengthened.

But the coalition agreed to beef up the plan - and recent changes seem to have all but erased the threat of a lawsuit.

The environmental center reviewed the compact Tuesday, and David Ferren, the attorney handling the center's negotiations, said the plan is "shaping up" to be a strong compact.

"There are still some gray areas we'd like to see cleared up," he said. "But I think the committee has gone a long way to address our concerns."

The whole process still could be derailed by a federal ruling on particle pollution, another health hazard that dogs the area.

The small particles, emitted primarily by power plants and manufacturers, can irritate the airways and create a host of health problems.

If the EPA finds the Piedmont Triad in violation of its standards for particle pollution, the region would fall under essentially the same regulations the ozone compact aims to avoid.

"That's going to undercut the motivation for a lot of municipalities to participate in these initiatives to reduce ozone," said Dan Besse, a Winston-Salem council member and environmental lawyer who chairs the ozone panel.

The EPA is expected to make a decision on the particle pollution designation by the end of the year.

The revised ozone proposal also still must pass muster with the EPA, which is expected to rule on the compact sometime early next year.

If approved, the Piedmont Triad will have to begin charting progress to avoid the federal regulations that would limit growth and place restrictions on new industries.

Work on the compact has enabled the Piedmont Triad to delay restrictions until 2007, although the region remains in violation of a new law that measures ozone levels over an eight-hour period.

The steps outlined in the compact should allow the area to come in just under the eight-hour ozone allowance by 2007, according to state data.

That's good news for the region's economic development efforts. And it's also good news for those who breathe the region's air.

"In general, the symptoms and the effects (of ozone) will be subtle," Young said. "But it's not good for us, even if we can't put our finger on dramatic effects."

"Certainly, we don't want to make matters worse."

Contact Elyse Ashburn at 373-7090 or eashburn@news-record.com