Bad air

[sky]

Right now where I live in Salt lake City because of the air inversion probelms we have in the winter we have the dubious distinction of having the worst air quality of anywhere in the United states. Welcome to Sundance everyone at the film festival in Park city about 30 minutes out of SLC.

Usually from our house we have a beautiful view of the mountains --and now you can't even see them at all. It is smoggy AND foggy. On my way to work yesterday The fog was so bad I could barely see the car's tail lights in front of me. And I was following too close because I didn't want to be blind and see nothing at all. The Great Salt Lake lake contributes to the fog as well of course--but the pollution is a big part of the grey gunk in the air. It's almost enough to make me long for the spring when we will have the terrible lake stink instead from the brine shrimp (just kidding). But the lake stink is real then.

They reported that particulate matter in the air is 2 1/2 to 3 times worse than in LA, New york, or chicago. And you can feel it in your throat, lungs and it's even making me sneeze as well.

They said particulate levels are so high and far exceed what even the goverment says is acceptable that it is unhealthy for everyone--not just people with health problems.

[DaveM]

Where does the "crud" come from? Is it local emissions or somebody else's mess carried by the wind until it gets trapped by your terrain?

[Eva]

I also live in an area that has the worst air of the country (petrochemical industry and it's gets blown our way by a refreshing seabreeze) Whenever it gets very warm in summer there are always smogalerts. However, I have been to Athens (in Greece yes, for you non-Europeans) I believe there aren't many places that are more polluted than that city. My goodness...

Eva

[sky]

Eva,

It sounds like you can relate.

DaveM,

There are several oil refineries here that I pass by on the freeway on my way to work and you can smell the gas smell when you go by.They have big smoke stacks burning.

Plus it is the pollution from the people that live here. You know how the polution usually rises up in the atmosphere and is damaging the ozone. When the inversion is here everything gets trapped almost in a bubble like iand we live in it rather than it going up to the atmosphere--which isn't good either for us or the environment.

Mid week next week they are predicting thatwe may possibly have a storm come through and that temorarily clears the inversion and the air quality improves quite a bit.
Sky

[DaveM]

That'll do it....I have never been able to figure out why no one has ever developed a "clean" refinery. It seems to me that if one is going to separate out all of those assorted chemicals, it ought to be worthwhile to capture them all and find a use for them.

I'd wondered if you weren't under an inversion. I recall visiting an area in Eastern Europe which had nickel smelters/chemical refineries and atmospherics caused by a nearby mountain range. Right near the various belching industries, the air was so bad that it would eat holes in laundry placed on a line to dry, and at least 15% of the babies born in the area had serious birth defects (some of the people's hair was either green or bleached white--and not Janis white, either). The crud in the air then leaped about 25 miles and dropped back down on another city where it turned the roofs green and the pigeons black. Estimates were that the city had suffered more damage in less than 25 years of polluted air than it had during the previous 1000 years of normal wear and tear. Truly a scary place....incredible history there but the unfiltered crap in the air is turning it into something out of a horror film.

That was in 1992, mind....I hope matters have improved since. As I recall, the national soccer team always played international matches in the city which produced all of the pollution. Locals were used to it--the visitors were invariably either depressed into submission or slowed down significantly by the "oxygen free" air.

[aabram]

I hate car exhaust fumes, my younger Daughter is asthmatic (slightly) besides getting run over when she was 7 on her way to school, but that's beside the point. Edinburgh is just as contributory to dirty air as any other city, as pointed out by .... the gravestones in St Cuthbert's Churchyard :rolleyes:

[Eva]

My goodness Dave. Yes, I have been to places like that in Hungary. It was a beautiful area. Hills, etc. And really, the air was very nice. That wasn't it. But there had to be something in the soil there. All the villagers looked like birds. And had the brains of birds too. Kind of scary.

Eva

[sky]

Dave, Holy **** thats scary:eek: :( And really sad. It's not that bad here. But yes the inversion is because of the mountains.

[DaveM]

Supposedly the most polluted place on earth is some town in Romania. Not sure I want to know the details, actually.

I do worry about how the places in Taiwan that recycle our batteries, etc. are going to fare in the long run.