Thread by @loganemitchell

🚨 New paper published: History of #AirQuality In Utah
👉 mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/1…

Utah has a long fascinating air quality history that that you wouldn't believe. Understanding our history can inform where we are today & our future.

Follow along 🧵...

Why care about air pollution? Because it has enormous health & economic impacts
Air quality health research done in Utah: mdpi.com/2073-4433/11/1…
Air quality economic impacts in Utah: mdpi.com/2073-4433/11/1…

While air quality typically ranks among the top 3 issues in Utah, most people think not enough is being done to address it. But when did that start?

One of the first recorded air quality mentions was from Brigham Young who in 1860 said:

"What constitutes health, wealth, joy & peace? In the first place, good pure air is the greatest sustainer of animal life."

He was pointing out the need for good home ventilation.

By 1881 "smoke" air pollution was getting bad & the @Deseret suggested that businesses that use a lot of coal should find a solution, otherwise SLC will have to resort to regulations.

We see the same attitude/approach today!

In 1891 SLC passed the first air pollution ordinance. That's 5 yrs before Utah statehood, so Utah has LITERALLY had air quality laws on the books for the entire history of the state!

Here's the law, it was a misdemeanor to emit dense clouds of smoke. Violators fined daily.

In 1893 urban developers considered air pollution when deciding where to build factories. Ended up putting them west of the Jordan river, aka the west side in SLC.

Those urban dev decisions contributed to redlining in 1940s & environmental justice issues today.

That 1893 article expressed a key concept that shows up throughout Utah's history:

Balancing environmental stewardship & economic development

Cleaning up our air was essential for Utah's growth. (ex today: @GovCox #OneUtah roadmap)

This 1912 @sltrib article blows me away. They knew air pollution:
- Wasted resources
- Had massive health impacts
- "Whole System of Power Conversion Ultimately May Be Changed"

We're making good progress on that last point 110 year later...

They knew air pollution would impact tourism

"Smoke Clouds Greet Tourists in Salt Lake"
"View of City Impossible"
"Visitors are unable to see the Walker building from the top of Hotel Utah" (2 blocks apart!)

In the 1910s women's groups organized to educate folks about air pollution and pass ordinances to address air pollution

In 1914 the #utleg created the Metallurgical Dept at @UUtah. Goal was to find a cleaner burning coal that didn't produce as much air pollution.

This shows Utah's heritage of using scientific ingenuity to address environmental challenges!

In 1919-1920 there was a major air quality study. Here's a scientist flying through the inversion to find out if SO2 from refineries were responsible for trapping coal emissions. They didn't know what a temperature inversion was!

One experiment they ran was leaving pails around SLC & collecting soot fall. That winter they found 1000 tons/sq mile of soot fell out of the air & 50% of it was combustible (indicating incomplete combustion & wasted fuel)

That is CRUNCHY air!

Side note: The incomplete combustion & wasted fuel or 1920 has parallels today with the massive natural gas (methane) leakage & wasted resources in the Uinta Basin

https://twitter.com/loganemitchell/status/1460803635290406912

In 1930 natural gas was introduced in SLC. Here's an ad promoting it. The text is hilarious!

Natural gas was much better than coal, but it took a long time to build out & now contributes to modern air pollution. The next phase will be 100% building electrification.

In the 1940s air pollution ordinances were front page news along with the build up to WWII. They even ran a "Today's Smoke" column for a while that's similar to our daily air quality index now!

During WWII there was a massive industrial mobilization to defeat fascism & air pollution got much worse for several years.

In the 1950s, researchers studied what inversions were and how they contributed to air pollution

In 1962 a major state report on air quality came out. It recommended more measurements since the technology was rapidly improving. Eventually led to to the passage of the Air Conservation Act of 1967.

In 1966 the Bountiful Mayor wrote an op-ed about how EVs would combat air pollution. He even recognized that EVs would be good for electric utilities. We're finally making some headway 56 years later...

In 1970 the federal Clean Air Act created the EPA & we got a comprehensive assessment of air quality. Look at the # of times we exceeded federal standards in 1970!! Standards have tightened since then, so there would have been more if we used today's standards.

The first fine particulate measurements (PM2.5) were made in 1981/82. These were taken every 6th day. PM2.5 regulations wouldn't be put in place until 1997 & regular measurements started after that.

In 1986-'87 a labor strike shut down Geneva steel for a year. Dr. Arden Pope from @BYU showed how higher pollution when the plant was running was correlated with children being admitted to the hospital.

In 1990 Gov Bangerter created a clean air commission. The commission determined Utah had 3 options:
1) Let pollution increase
2) Just meet federal standards
3) Really tackle the problem

For the last 30yrs, we've chosen option 2 (but we haven't made it yet)

Takeaways:
- Air quality today is probably better than any time since 1890, but we still exceed federal air quality standards & have work to do!
- Regulations have helped, but folks think govt isn't doing enough.
- Environmental stewardship is essential for economic development.

Even as we're seeing progress on air quality, we're now experiencing severe climate impacts that're making air quality worse, drying the Great Salt Lake, causing heatwaves, etc. Since air pollution is co-emitted with GHGs, the solutions to both challenges are to reduce emissions.

The biggest difference today (& what gives me hope) is we now have economically viable clean energy technologies for the first time in history. We're going to see immense improvement in air quality as they get deployed. It's going to happen, question is when.

I talked about this on the @CityCastSLC podcast with @AliVallarta here:
cms.megaphone.fm/channel/cityca…

You can also watch my presentation to the @UTHistory annual conference here:

@UUtah @UofUCMES @UofUAirLab @sustainableuofu @UtahDEQ @UtahDigNews @MarriottLibrary @UTHistory @GovCox @LGHendersonUtah @RepJohnCurtis @SenatorRomney @sltrib @Deseret @KSLcom @heraldextra

This is just a broad overview & there's lots more fascinating stories. Want to go deeper? I have all these links in a giant Google doc I'm working on. DM or email me if you want to contribute to it! docs.google.com/document/d/1RC…