Increased ambient air quality monitoring in Pennsylvania is welcome

To the Editor:
Clean Air Council welcomes the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) announcement that it will expand the state’s air monitoring network for fine particulate matter (p.m. 2.5). The expansion will increase ambient air quality monitoring in rural areas near unconventional gas drilling operations and compressor stations, and will be focused on the state’s northern tier and southwest corner where gas wells and compressor stations are clustered. Pennsylvania residents who live near this gas infrastructure have long been asking for increased air monitoring so that they will know what they are breathing. Prolonged exposure to fine particulate pollution is associated with respiratory disease, and children and the elderly are especially vulnerable to the impacts of this pollution. DEP’s air monitor expansion will provide important data that DEP will be able to use when designing future air regulations.
“As Pennsylvania’s natural gas industry has spread over the past several years, our information-gathering has not always kept pace,” said Joseph Otis Minott, Esq., Executive Director of the Clean Air Council. “Shalefield residents have often been left in the dark about the quality of the air they breathe and, without adequate data, are unable to take action when they suspect air pollution is harming their health. I am encouraged by DEP’s decision to expand its ambient air monitoring network, and hope that we will see an even broader expansion in the near future.”
Eva Roben
Climate Change Outreach Coordinator
Clean Air Council
Philadelphia