The Columbus Dispatch

Steamy weather hasn’t hurt air quality

- By Beth Burger The Columbus Dispatch

Despite temperatur­es topping 90 degrees several times this summer, there has been only one airquality alert issued so far in the Columbus area.

Heat and sunlight increase the rate of chemical reaction to create ozone. It’s formed when nitrogen oxides and organic volatile compounds are cooked in the atmosphere. Sources of ozone pollution include cars, trucks, buses, engines and power plants.

“But if you get winds coming into the city, that actually pushes the pollution out. It disperses, spreads it out so it doesn’t build up and reach really high concentrat­ions,” said Brooke White, air-quality program coordinato­r for the Mid-ohio Regional Planning Commission, which monitors air quality and issues alerts to the public.

The only alert so far this summer was issued June 28, when ozone pollution concentrat­ions in air-quality monitoring hit 93 parts per billion.

Color-coded air-quality alerts are pushed out when there’s ozone formation. Orange levels, hitting above 101 ppb on the air-quality index, could affect sensitive groups — children, the elderly and those with asthma and lung diseases — who might have difficulty breathing. The color code turns to red if everyone’s breathing is affected, which would be 151 ppb or above on the index.

In Ohio, 9.9% of the population, or 888,520 people, have been diagnosed with asthma, according to 2017 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the most recent data available.

The population is projected to increase in central Ohio by at least 500,000 more people by 2035.

“So that’s going to be more cars on our roadways,” White said, noting a need for people to carpool or use public transporta­tion to drive ozone formation down.

Ozone pollution season runs from March through October. Conditions are typically worse on hot, sunny days.

Columbus typically has a few days exceeding air-quality standards each season. In 2018, there were three days. In 2017, there was one incident as of July 25. But by the end of the season that year, there were four days exceeding standards.

The region previously had about 30 days per season from 1993 to 2018, according to an air-quality report issued by MORPC. The difference in recent years is an overall improvemen­t in air quality through new technology and other means.

The U.S. Environmen­tal Protection Agency defines the Columbus metro area as Franklin, Fairfield, Licking and Delaware counties and lists it as a marginal nonattainm­ent area for the 2015 ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standard. The Ohio Environmen­tal Protection Agency has petitioned the federal EPA to list the metro area as being in attainment. Public comments are being accepted through Aug. 2, after which the federal EPA will issue a final ruling.

Rain helped bring the metro area into compliance. Preliminar­y data for 20162018 showed central Ohio’s air pollution concentrat­ions at 69 parts per billion — just below the current federal ozone limit of 70 parts per billion.

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