Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Air Quality Awareness Week: Where’s Your AQI Coming From? #AQAW2020

Image Credit: Air Data - Multiyear Tile Plot from EPA.gov

The Air Quality Index (AQI) is a tool produced by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to communicate current air quality conditions in a specific area. The AQI is calculated based on the concentration of pollutants in the air and assigned a corresponding value between 0 to 300+. AQI values below 100 generally represent satisfactory conditions, between 100 and 200 can be hazardous to sensitive populations, and anything over 200 is considered hazardous to everyone.

Knowing current AQI can help people make real-time decisions on outdoor activities and reduce your exposure to unhealthy levels of pollution. Current air quality conditions can be found using the AirNow tool from EPA.

The EPA also provides historical AQI from the past 25 years, as seen in the image above, and is used to analyze trends over time. The Historical AQI Data tool can be found here.

To learn more about AQI and how it is calculated visit the Air Quality Awareness Week website

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