Dive Brief:
-
Forty-four percent of U.S. residents live in a county that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution, and 33 million live in counties with failing grades for ozone and short-term and long-term particle pollution (also known as smog), the American Lung Association’s 27th annual State of the Air report found.
- The report examines data centers as “a newer, rapidly-growing contributor” to air pollution, noting that “communities located near large data center clusters often experience higher localized pollution burdens than regional averages, particularly when facilities are sited in already overburdened or economically disadvantaged areas.”
-
Bangor, Maine, was the only city to make the cleanest cities list for all three pollution sources measured in the report. “This is a change from historic reports, which had multiple cities on that list,” said Diana Van Vleet, director of nationwide clean air advocacy for ALA. She called this “another grim indication of the deterioration of air quality nationwide.”
Dive Insight:
The State of the Air report, released Wednesday, grades counties’ air quality based on data from 2022 through 2024.
“While we have seen significant progress in cleaning up the air over the past 50-plus years, 152 million people across the country are still living in areas with unhealthy levels of ozone or particle pollution,” Van Vleet said. “No city and no place is immune from air pollution.”
Extreme heat, drought and wildfires are exposing more people to ozone, particularly in southwestern states from California to Texas and most of the Midwest, the report states. The number of people living in counties with ground-level ozone pollution has increased by nearly 4 million since last year’s report. Los Angeles is the city most polluted by ozone, followed by Visalia and Bakersfield in California, Phoenix and Fresno, California, according to the report.
Just under 76 million people live in counties that received failing grades for year-round particle pollution, 9.1 million fewer than last year’s report but still the third-largest number in the report’s history — “a sobering reminder of the widespread, chronic nature of this deadly form of air pollution,” the report states. Bakersfield; Brownsville, Texas; and Eugene, Oregon, had the highest levels.
The number of people living in counties that received failing grades for spikes in particle pollution fell by 15.6 million to 62 million in this year’s report — still “significantly higher” than the record-low 31.5 million in 2018. Fairbanks, Alaska; Eugene and Bakersfield had the highest levels of short-term particle pollution.
Pittsburgh Works Together, an economic development alliance, pushed back on the report’s failing grade for particle pollution in the Pittsburgh metro area. The ALA report ranks Pittsburgh 11th of the 25 U.S. cities most polluted by short-term particle pollution and 16th among the top 25 U.S. cities most polluted by year-round particle pollution.
“Each year, Pittsburgh Works Together publishes an assessment of the region’s air quality based on long-accepted [Environmental Protection Agency] data, data that is readily available to anyone,” PWT Executive Director Jeff Nobers said in a statement. “We believe this provides a more accurate picture than the Lung Association’s report.”
Across the U.S., the combined emissions of six key air pollutants fell by 78% between 1970, when the Clean Air Act passed, and 2020, the ALA report states, citing EPA data. But “hard-fought progress is at grave risk,” it says, accusing the Trump administration EPA of “weakening, delaying and eliminating clean air protections.”
“The good news is that the Clean Air Act works, clean air protections work, and we need to protect them,” Van Vleet said. “We need to tell the EPA to return to their mission to protect health and the environment.”
Local governments are “a critical part of the action that we need to see,” she added. Cities can reduce air pollution through investments in transportation options like infrastructure for walking and biking and electric buses. They can require that more electricity — including electricity used by data centers — come from non-combustion energy sources. Municipalities should also adopt policies to reduce emissions from buildings, manufacturing facilities and freight activities, Van Vleet said in an email to Smart Cities Dive.
