Moving from Washington State... Yet another air quality question. (Layton: 2015, home)

[twinx85]

So, I'm possibly going to be moving down to the SLC area for work in the next few months, and am looking for an area to buy a house. I know SLC gets bad, but I was also looking at areas like Clearfield, Layton, and Tooele. Are any of those as bad, or is everywhere bad? And when is the worst time of year?

I think the air quality issues are my main qualm when it comes to moving... I currently live in a tiny town in WA, pretty far from the city, and the only issues we have is during wildfire season when the smoke makes its way over the mountains (which is rarely).

Anyway, I'm just wondering if this is a big enough reason to reconsider the move, or if the other areas I was looking at may be better? Or, if I just go to work and home, could I avoid the worst of it, for the most part?

[CCSLC]

The inversion happens everywhere in the valley, including Clearfield and Layton. Tooele less so.

January is the worst time of year, with up to 10 or so days considered "unhealthy." We may also have a handful in February, too.

Before you let these ~15 potential days deter you from the other 350 days of living here, you might consider this:
The people who lived here in the 1970s and 1980s endured up to 60x as much air pollution as we do now, even on the WORST air quality days. And most of us are doing just fine. (http://www.city-data.com/forum/41327251-post4.html)

[movingonagain777]

Statistics here:

Air Quality Statistics Report | AirData | US EPA


Facts about Utah's Air | Utah Moms for Clean Air



Utah gets F on air quality report card: Check your county’s grade here | fox13now.com


Utah Air Quality | Utah Chapter Sierra Club


UtahAir - Home


A History of the Inversion: A Foe That Grows Stronger | Utah Political Capitol


NationalJournal

[twinx85]

@CCSLC You have a good point about the 15 days vs. the rest of the year... I've lived in WA for 30 years (my whole life), and am bummed, yet excited about having to move; and up here, the air quality is pretty great 99.99% of the year, so I think I just started getting really worried after reading/researching too much. Especially after reading stuff comparing SLC to Beijing (which, granted, seems a little over zealous to compare the two, even from my uneducated point of view).

There's alerts and stuff on really bad days, right? And what about the "red" days I read about where there's no driving... Dumb question, but what about driving to work? I'm looking at living in Tooele now, and it's a little far to walk. Lol.

[CCSLC]

Like most residents, you're confusing and combining two distinct systems that alert residents to air quality issues. (Be aware that many of the links posted by movingonagain777 also inappropriately confuse the two systems and contain information that is just plain incorrect.)

The first system, a color-coded health alert notification, alerts residents to when air quality is good (green), moderate (yellow), unhealthy for sensitive groups, like people with asthma or other lung or heart conditions (orange), and unhealthy (degrees of red and purple depending on how unhealthy, depending on particulate level). Each winter, we have many "yellow" air days, several "orange" days, and a handful of "red" air health days.

The second system, which has no color associated with it, determines when certain activities that affect air quality are legal or not. This second system is a set of three “air action” notifications:
-unrestricted action (there are no bans on any activity);
-voluntary action requested (residents are asked to refrain from wood-burning [in Salt Lake County, however, it's not voluntary to stop burning; SL residents are required to refrain from burning on "voluntary" days], and are asked to limit car use by car pooling, using mass transit, etc.);
-mandatory action (residents are required to refrain from wood-burning throughout the Wasatch Front, and are strongly encouraged to refrain from driving). This is when many large, community-minded employers' policies on telecommuting or flex schedules go into effect, if you're lucky enough to work for one; for example, at one place I worked, mandatory air action days automatically meant I (and others who did not interact with the public face-to-face) was allowed to work from home via VPN.

Note that even on mandatory action days, driving (and really everything else but wood-burning) is technically still legal. You should, of course, try not to for everyone's benefit, but if you absolutely must drive, you do. Personally, I try to postpone errands on action days (both voluntary and mandatory) until things are back to "unrestricted," or I walk or ride TRAX to do the errands on those days.

These two systems are separate because we can be having a "green" health air day, but meteorologists might notice a weather pattern that could cause an inversion to develop tomorrow, so the state issues a voluntary air action notice despite us currently having healthy air; they're trying to get people to change behavior so, if an inversion does develop, there is less pollution available to be trapped. So, while related to one another, the two systems are distinct; one is a current health status indicator and the other is trying to prevent future health statuses from being even worse by encouraging behavior change.

You can see the two types of alerts here on the state's air forecast page for Salt Lake County. There is also an app to notify you of alerts, and they are widely broadcast through the media, too.

As far as I know, we have never been past the first level of "red" since the health system was established (meaning we've never reached "very unhealthy" or "hazardous," which are the two places Beijing would routinely be if they used this system, so comparing us to them is really not valid), though it's worth noting that those of us who lived here in the 70s and 80s spent many days in the "very unhealthy" or "hazardous" range (particularly before vehicle emissions laws went into effect) and just didn't know it at the time...and most of us are still here with no noticeable health effects from it (yet, anyway).

[Geo-Aggie]

Our air quality issue here really does feel overblown.

Is it an issue? Yes.
Is it an issue that would stop me from moving here? Pfffft... no.

We have some nasty days, maybe 2-3 weeks in the winter have moderate to Unsafe for Sensitive Groups PM2.5 levels, otherwise particulates are rather average for a mid-sized city. Then ozone tends to be high on the hottest, sunniest days of the summer, but the rest of the year we have regular city ozone levels. Even on the worst days, it's never bad enough that you shouldn't be outside - it's more like bad enough that you probably shouldn't go run a 10k. If you have severe asthma, yeah, maybe it would flare up on those days, but not moving here because of air pollution is about as sensible as not moving to Seattle because of volcanoes.

Thinking back on the year, the worst air pollution we had all year was due to the fires in Washington/Idaho, and that had negative effects on the whole Western US.