Daily pollution update in usa

The coronavirus pandemic has put much of the world into lockdown, with factories going idle and city streets turning into eerily empty walkways. With the case count and death toll still climbing, it’s unlikely that countries will be able to flick a switch and rapidly return to pre-pandemic economic activity.

But one unintended upside to this crisis has been improved air quality, particularly in the hardest-hit areas where the most draconian measures have gone into force. This has been evident in Asia, including China’s Hubei province, where this virus began spreading among humans. It’s also a trend observed in Italy, another devastated region with several thousand deaths.

Now, given that all but a handful of states have implemented stay-at-home orders, the air-quality shifts are also being seen in the United States. This offers a rare — and unintended — large-scale experiment for scientists to see how human emissions contribute to hazardous air quality and analyze the effectiveness of particular policy ideas.

These maps show the amounts of nitrogen dioxide in the atmosphere, a key ingredient in smog, between March 1 and April 5, 2019, when compared to the same period this year. They show the subtle decreases in NO2 in much of the country, including the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast, Ohio Valley and Southwest.

Great progress has been made in achieving national air quality standards, which EPA originally established in 1971 and updates periodically based on the latest science. One sign of this progress is that visible air pollution is less frequent and widespread than it was in the 1970s.

However, air pollution can be harmful even when it is not visible. Newer scientific studies have shown that some pollutants can harm public health and welfare even at very low levels. EPA in recent years revised standards for five of the six common pollutants subject to national air quality standards. EPA made the standards more protective because new, peer-reviewed scientific studies showed that existing standards were not adequate to protect public health and the environment.

Status of common pollutant problems in brief
Today, pollution levels in many areas of the United States exceed national air quality standards for at least one of the six common pollutants:

Although levels of particle pollution and ground-level ozone pollution are substantially lower than in the past, levels are unhealthy in numerous areas of the country. Both pollutants are the result of emissions from diverse sources, and travel long distances and across state lines.

An extensive body of scientific evidence shows that long- and short-term exposures to fine particle pollution, also known as fine particulate matter (PM2.5), can cause premature death and harmful effects on the cardiovascular system, including increased hospital admissions and emergency department visits for heart attacks and strokes. Scientific evidence also links PM to harmful respiratory effects, including asthma attacks.

Ozone can increase the frequency of asthma attacks, cause shortness of breath, aggravate lung diseases, and cause permanent damage to lungs through long-term exposure. Elevated ozone levels are linked to increases in hospitalizations, emergency room visits and premature death.

Both pollutants cause environmental damage, and fine particles impair visibility.

Fine particles can be emitted directly or formed from gaseous emissions including sulfur dioxide or nitrogen oxides. Ozone, a colorless gas, is created when emissions of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds react.

For unhealthy peak levels of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide, EPA is working with states and others on ways to determine where and how often unhealthy peaks occur. Both pollutants cause multiple adverse respiratory effects including increased asthma symptoms, and are associated with increased emergency department visits and hospital admissions for respiratory illness. Both pollutants cause environmental damage, and are byproducts of fossil fuel combustion.

Airborne lead pollution, a nationwide health concern before EPA phased out lead in motor vehicle gasoline under Clean Air Act authority, now meets national air quality standards except in areas near certain large lead-emitting industrial facilities. Lead is associated with neurological effects in children, such as behavioral problems, learning deficits and lowered IQ, and high blood pressure and heart disease in adults.

The entire nation meets the carbon monoxide air quality standards, largely because of emissions standards for new motor vehicles under the Clean Air Act.

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Kelli Grant joins Lunch Break to reveal the most polluted cities in the U.S. Photo: Getty Images.

Top Five Most Polluted U.S. Cities Kelli Grant joins Lunch Break to reveal the most polluted cities in the U.S. Photo: Getty Images. Click here to subscribe to our channel: http://www.youtube....

Dozens of states have announced plans to relax social distancing restrictions aimed at not only curbing the spread of the coronavirus, but also bringing the faltering economy back to life.

Nearly half of the nation's population - about 150 million people - live with and breathe polluted air, "placing their health and lives at risk," according to a new report released Tuesday by the American Lung Association, a public health group.

Is there any "good news" related to the coronavirus? Perhaps, in reduced air pollution and carbon emissions - and in some places, lives saved. The coronavirus "is already slashing fossil fuel use and corresponding carbon and air pollution emissions in China, Italy and beyond," Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe said Monday.