The Chamber Board of Directors wishes to respond to the recently released American Lung Association 2010 Air Quality report.  In reviewing the more than 170 pages in this document, we found that, as with many scientific studies, there are different perspectives that come into play when summarizing and reporting the information. While we are not stating that the air quality in the Mid-Ohio valley is top-notch, we also believe that too often our region is portrayed in the worst way and misleading statements are made. We hope to clarify and present the report statistics from a different perspective.

 

Generally a comprehensive analysis of overall air quality examines five potential pollutants. This study only looked at two elements of air quality: ozone and particles. Those missing from this report are nitrogen oxides, sulphur dioxide, and organic matters.

 

Let’s look the particle and ozone measurements (Note: data is from EPA air quality studies) which were used by the American Lung Association. Only selected counties in each state were measured, and out of 916 counties measured for ozone, 414 or 45% were rated as failed for ozone days by the American Lung Association.

 

For those who have worked for years to reduce ozone levels, there was good news reported in April by the Ohio EPA.  In an April 29 press release the Ohio EPA reported that the entire state of Ohio is now meeting the federal ozone standard. The American Lung Association based their failing grades on proposed, not mandated, ozone standards.

 

Another way of looking at air quality is to do a comparison with other counties. Orange indicates ozone levels at a range considered by the American Lung Association as unhealthy for sensitive groups; red is unhealthy, purple is very unhealthy and maroon is hazardous.

 

Washington County and Wood County are both at one-tenth of California’s weighted average  and low compared to other areas.  Take a look at the table below:

 

 

 

The second measure of air quality is the number of days with high particle counts. For this part of the report, an even smaller number of counties were reviewed for particle pollution.  Here we find that of the 575 counties measured, 84% received passing scores, including our area. 

 

It was reported that the American Lung Association ranked Parkersburg-Marietta area among the 25 worst for year-round particle pollution. Yet when we reviewed the county data in this latest report we discovered that Wood Count, WV received a PASSING score of 14.6.

 

Here’s the more interesting fact: Washington County was marked DNC, meaning that data was not collected for our county. We fail to understand why our area was cited as among the 25 worst given that the two counties in the Parkersburg-Marietta metropolitan area were rated Pass and DNC.  

 

The chart shows a comparison of 4 Ohio counties (Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati and Marietta), Wood County, WV (Parkersburg) with the counties for Los Angeles and Pittsburgh. Again, even looking at the Wood County, the weighted average is quite low.

 

 

*A score under 15 is considered Pass.

 

Air quality in the Mid-Ohio Valley does reflect our manufacturing economy and our geographical location in a river valley. It has improved considerably over the years as seen in the declining number of ozone days reported and in the decrease from the 2009 report of the high particle days statement. While there is still room for improvement, our air quality is better than much of the country and it does not deserve the continued negative press.