Citizen Smokereaders
Hotline, Summer 2002
by Suzanne Seppi, GASP Executive Director
Thankfully, Pittsburgh is no longer the smoky city, but we still see smokestacks that have visible emissions. These less dramatic emissions may add up to decreased visibility, soot and health problems. It is (for most pollution sources) a violation to discharge emissions with a 60% opactiy or greater from a flue at any time or to release emissions with an opacity of 20% for three minutes or greater in an hour. Opacity excludes steam.
With these emissions in mind, the Group Against Smog and Pollution (GASP) and Clean Water Action submitted a proposal through the Allegheny County Health Department’s Air Pollution Advisory Committee to train up to ten citizens to read the opacity from smokestacks.
The Advisory Committee sent this proposal to the Board of Health and, with the Board’s support, it was approved by the County. The proposal asked for funding from the Clean Air Fund in order to send the smoke readers to “smoke school” and also for the administering of this program by GASP.
In April 2002, the volunteer smoke readers went to a training school run by Eastern Technical Associates in Allegheny County, This is the same traveling school that offers training and re-certification for Allegheny County Health Department Air Quality inspectors and those from other states. The citizen smoke readers learned, among other things, how to identify levels of opacity, how to properly view a stack and where to stand when observing smokestack emissions.
Each volunteer was required to pass an opacity reading test. The smoke readers are now ready to observe facilities in Allegheny County on a regular basis in a manner that should provide accurate readings.
If there appears to be an exceedance during an observation, the reader will report it to GASP, and we in turn will relate the information to the company. A report will also go to the Air Quality Division of the Allegheny County Health Department. Any observations made by the volunteer smoke readers will not carry enforcable weight but will provide notice to the Air Quality staff and the company that there may be a problem that needs to be investigated.
Thanks to this citizen corps of volunteers, the violating companies and the County’s Air Quality Division should be able to react to problem emissions on a focused and more timely basis.
If you would like to be a smoke reader, contact GASP at (412) 441-6650 for more details.