Several counties across our region do not meet federal standards for safe air quality. Some are expected to experience potentially harmful air quality during the warm months ahead.
Seven of the eight Mountain West states have at least one county that violates the Environmental Protection Agency's National Ambient Air Quality Standard, a complicated set of factors that measures air quality.
The most problematic issues are a combination of particulates from wildfires, ground-level ozone pollution, and heat.
The National Weather Service forecasts that most of the Mountain West will be "above" the average warmth or "likely above" in the three months ahead.
The areas surrounding Las Vegas are already facing an air quality advisory for the entire summer. It's an issue that places like Las Vegas face every summer and it continues to get worse.
"And we've seen three of our last six or seven years — our highest years for exceedance dates for ozone were also years we had heavy wildfire smoke come into Clark County," said Clark County Air Quality Division spokesperson Kevin MacDonald. "We have smoke from hundreds of miles away. So pollutants that will blow in from Southern California or even overseas will come into Clark County and settle in and that helps cook ozone."
Phoenix and Albuquerque face similar issues with the same topography and high heat. Counties in higher elevations surrounding Denver and Salt Lake City are also expected to face high levels of pollutants this summer.
Real time air quality updates can be accessed at AirNow.gov.
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio (KNPR) in Las Vegas, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Colorado and KANW in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
