"We're seeing that air quality is highly affected by climate change and more specifically by wildfires, which are in urban areas, which involve a whole lot more toxicants than your forest fires that we normally experience," said Glory Dolphin-Hammes, CEO of IQAir.
"When we look at urban wildfires, we're looking at homes, we're looking at building materials, we're looking at e-waste as well, electronic materials being burned, plastic being burned, Formaldehyde-based building materials also being burned, lead-based paint being burned," Dolphin-Hammes said. "So, these are all high-level toxicants, cancer-causing on the highest level."
"Wildfire smoke can travel pretty far, thousands of miles basically, we had the Midwest and the East Coast heavily affected by wildfires, not in the U.S., but wildfires that were based in Canada," she explained.
"This new era it is definitely driven by climate change," she said. "Ozone that is basically heat-driven has been able to impact the air quality not in a positive way."
"You've got what's called your hyperlocal pockets," Dolphin-Hammes said. "In some areas, especially marginalized areas, they actually have less monitoring, less sensors available."
"Unfortunately, we are taking quite some steps backward. We breathe on average, 30,000 times a day, so in children, they breathe about 40,000 times a day," she said. "When we do the math, our air quality is so much more important than we actually think."
"What really drives and makes LA the worst in the U.S. in terms of major cities is actually our transportation," Dolphin-Hammes said. "The biggest contributor to air pollution and transportation is the choice that we make to use our personal vehicles to travel around. City planners can help us to develop and build communities that are truly walkable."
Air pollution kills more people globally each year than smoking, and thousands of those deaths are in California. Protecting yourself starts with awareness. Check the air quality before you head outside and take steps to keep the air inside your home clean.
In Southern California, clear skies don't always mean clean air.
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