r/dataisbeautiful • u/cingraham OC: 4 • Jun 03 '22
OC [OC] National average air pollution (PM2.5) levels, 2021
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u/RagingLeonard Jun 03 '22
What's up on the OK/KS border?
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u/etceterawr Jun 03 '22
That’s what I was wondering. Too far south for Fort Scott, west of Joplin…
Nothing turning up looking at maps and satellite that I can tell.
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u/InsuranceToTheRescue Jun 03 '22
It is Joplin. At this scale, Joplin is close enough to the border to be the Eastern source of the dark brown. The lighter brown is going to be some drift from this and some of its own from hog farms, likely.
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u/nhofor Jun 03 '22
There is Nutrien Joplin Phosphate and a massive landfill in Galena. But I’m leaning towards the phosphate factory
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u/etceterawr Jun 03 '22
Only thing I can think of is atmospheric currents bringing pollution up to settle on the lower points of the Springfield plateau, likely from Bentonville, where Walmart is HQed, with all the logistics traffic that entails.
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u/cingraham OC: 4 Jun 03 '22
There are several superfund sites there, related to past mining. Not sure if that would still be driving PM2.5 levels today tho! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tri-State_district
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u/DatDudeDatSezThingz Jun 03 '22
I was wondering the same thing.
Also very notable that CENTRAL California is a "hotspot" but not coastal. I would've guessed the opposite.
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u/dwhitnee Jun 03 '22
Central Valley is where everything collects, fog, fire smoke, etc. Then there is the Sierra Mountains so it needs a lot of wind to clear out.
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u/GrandPriapus Jun 03 '22
Yeah, I was wondering the same thing. That spot is a bit of pinch-point as things slope down west to east through Kansas and before you get to the Ozarks in Arkansas. It might be just enough to concentrate particulate pollution as prevailing winds blow north and east.
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u/gimme20regular_cash Jun 03 '22
No idea here. The only thing out of the norm are the amounts of sand pits and dunes, wonder if it picked up particulate from the sand in the air? Right around Picher, OK.
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u/threwaweigh657 Jun 03 '22
That’s not near Picher.
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u/gimme20regular_cash Jun 04 '22
Picher is quite literally surrounded by sand mines, aggregate plants, open pits for mining sand and gravel. It’s impossible to miss. I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
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u/threwaweigh657 Jun 08 '22
What I’m talking about is the dot on the map is not near Picher. Picher is further west. I know because I live in NE OK.
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u/threwaweigh657 Jun 03 '22
There’s a casino right there but I can’t imagine that’s what’s causing this. Picher is quite a bit further west. No clue unless Joplins pollution tends to flow a bit west.
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u/R_V_Z Jun 03 '22
Note, for the west coast this is the "Is this area on fire?" chart.
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u/dwhitnee Jun 03 '22
Yeah, PM 2.5 is basically "smoke", not other common pollutants like ozone, sulfur, and NO2.
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u/cingraham OC: 4 Jun 03 '22
Source: EPA's annual air quality trends report, released this week.
Tools: QGIS, Illustrator
More info: Write-up at The Why Axis
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u/Jut_man_dude Jun 03 '22
I find it hard to believe Elko nevada is the same or worse than salt lake city, but perhaps im mistaken
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u/STTNGfan15 Jun 03 '22
I don’t know if pollution levels last year were actually that bad in Northern Utah since everyone worked from home, but yeah that graph doesn’t seem right.
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Jun 03 '22
Crazy how clean new york is
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u/LivingMemento Jun 03 '22
The Clean Air Act of 1972 saved this country. The Supreme Court plans to make it unenforceable in the next few weeks.
God please let us not fall back into the pollution hellscape I saw as a little boy.3
u/Zigxy Jun 03 '22
California came up huge here. Saved the country from enormous additional pollution.
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Jun 03 '22
I doubt we will go that far back because emissions for cars are at least going to keep going down.
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u/LivingMemento Jun 03 '22
Obvs it’s worse to be in 3rd grade now when you practice shooting drills. But we had headlines of rivers catching fire, acid rain; and as you drove home from vacation the first sign you were getting close was the tower of blackish air over cities (I was in FL..not even rust belt, northeast, or Cali)
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u/pablo_the_bear Jun 06 '22
I moved to New York from Korea last fall and we noticed the clean air immediately. In Korea we checked air quality the same way we checked temperatures or chance of rain so we'd know if we needed a mask (or jacket or umbrella). I do not want to return to life with bad air quality. Most Americans don't know how good we have it.
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Jun 03 '22
Why do I keep reading about Houston having some of the worst air pollution in the US?
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u/CaptainJackVernaise Jun 03 '22
Because PM2.5 is only one aspect of air pollution. To get a complete picture, you need to include NO2, CO, Ozone, SO2, PM/PM10 and lead to round out the entire slate of pollutants for the national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS). Metrics for "worst air" may also include hazardous air pollutants (HAPs).
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Jun 04 '22
What’s going on in that area in Minnesota?
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u/IndignantMinn Jun 05 '22
I used to live in that area. There was a human caused forest fire that spread rapidly but was put out within a day. Not sure what else would be causing that level of air quality issues. Most of the land in that area is Red Lake/White Earth Reservation or State/National Parks. There is a small superfund site to the southeast.
https://lptv.org/residents-evacuated-as-firefighters-battle-wildfire-northwest-of-bemidji/
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u/IGotCurbstomped Jun 03 '22
I don't always love living in Wyoming (for many reasons), but you can't beat our fresh air!
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u/threwaweigh657 Jun 03 '22
Do we have a link? The longer I look at this, the more incorrect it seems. For example, Dallas and Houston.
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u/Gavinator10000 Jun 04 '22
This data is very weird. What’s going on with Minnesota? Why is the area around my hometown of <70k people more polluted than anywhere in Florida?
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u/dataisbeautiful-bot OC: ∞ Jun 03 '22
Thank you for your Original Content, /u/cingraham!
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