Heat, smog combine to trigger Bay Area air alert

“The most important thing we can all do to keep the air clean is to reduce our driving.” Jack Broadbent, Bay Area AQMD executive officer

The Bay Area Air Quality Management District issued a Spare the Air alert for Saturday, when smog from cars would collide with a heat wave expected to push temperatures in parts of the Bay Area over 100 degrees.

On Twitter, air quality officials urged people to “limit driving to reduce air pollution.”

“With millions of cars on our roads and another heat wave affecting the Bay Area, air quality is expected to be unhealthy on Saturday,” Jack Broadbent, executive officer of the air district, said in a press release. “The most important thing we can all do to keep the air clean is to reduce our driving.”

The air district issues Spare the Air alerts when ozone pollution is forecast to reach unhealthy levels, which can cause throat irritation and chest pain, and trigger asthma. This is the fifth Spare the Air alert this year — they were also issued during the heat wave in midJune.

Last year’s recordbreaking wildfire season severely impacted Bay Area air quality, which saw a record 46 Spare the Air days in 2020.

When a Spare the Air alert is issued, outdoor exercise should be done only in the early morning hours when the concentration of ozone pollution is lower, according to the air district.

The Spare the Air alert comes after the National Weather Service issued an excessive heat warning for much of the interior region of Northern California through late Sunday.