How’s The Air Quality In Your City? American Lung Association 2010 Report

Source: American Lung Association

Key Findings

The State of the Air 2010 shows that the air quality in many places has improved, but that over 175 million people—roughly 58 percent—still suffer pollution levels that are too often dangerous to breathe. Unhealthy air remains a threat to the lives and health of millions of people in the United States, despite great progress. Even as the nation explores the complex challenges of global warming and energy, air pollution lingers as a widespread and dangerous reality.

The State of the Air 2010 report looks at levels of ozone and particle pollution found in monitoring sites across the United States in 2006, 2007, and 2008. The report uses the most current quality-assured nationwide data available for these analyses.

For particle pollution, the report examines fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in two different ways: averaged year-round (annual average) and over short-term levels (24-hour). For both ozone and short-term particle pollution, the analysis uses a weighted average number of days that allows recognition of places with higher levels of pollution. For the year-round particle pollution rankings, the report uses averages calculated and reported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. For comparison, the State of the Air 2009 report covered data from 2005, 2006 and 2007.1

The strongest improvement came in the year-round (annual) particle pollution levels, but most of the cities with the highest ozone and short-term particle levels improved as well. These results show that cleaning up major sources of air pollution produces healthier air. However, the continuing problem demonstrates that more remains to be done, especially in cleaning up coal-fired power plants and existing diesel engines. The results also show the need for stronger limits on national air pollution levels—a fight that the American Lung Association has long led as a key to healthier air.

For the first time, the State of the Air 2010 includes population estimates for another at-risk group, people living in poverty. As discussed under Health Effects, people who have low incomes face higher risk of harm from air pollution. The population estimates here are based in the poverty definition used by the U.S. Census Bureau.

City Rankings

The American Lung Association State of the Air 2010 report ranks the metropolitan areas by the levels of ozone and particle pollution during 2006, 2007 and 2008. For particle pollution, we rank separately the areas with high year-round (annual average) levels and high short-term levels (24-hour) found in monitoring sites across the United States, We take the data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to compile the rankings. Each city includes all the counties that form the economic and transportation network that makes up the metropolitan area, as defined by the federal government. For more information about how we grade and rank cities, go to Methodology.

Most Polluted Cities
The cities are ranked by the air quality in the most polluted county in the metropolitan area. Click on the city name to open links to a chart of the trends for ozone and year-round particle levels, as well as more information about air pollution and the local Lung Association. Note that some cities have high levels of one pollutant and don’t show up on other lists.

Cleanest Cities
The cities on the cleanest cities lists for ozone and for short-term levels of particle pollution had no days with unhealthy levels of ozone or particle pollution. These lists are not ranked because all the cities earned the same scores. The cities on the list of the cleanest for year-round particle pollution levels are ranked by their average levels of particles, as calculated by the EPA. Note that some cities are clean for one category, but not for others.

County rankings and cleanest county lists are also available in the full report.