It was the second such exceedance of the year at that air quality monitor, according to preliminary data. As a reminder, H2S concentrations at the Liberty monitor exceeded the state 24-hour average standard 54 times last year – which was more than two times 2020’s numbers. There were 18 other such exceedances at Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in North Braddock Borough. Despite the regularity with which these exceedances occur – and despite regularly calling on ACHD to better communicate the issue with residents – health department leadership has stayed completely quiet. Yes, it issued an H2S-related enforcement action against U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works in April (and an associated press release), but no further information has been provided since then – not on the action specifically or the H2S problem generally. “GASP takes pride in being an air quality watchdog and helping to keep people informed on when air quality is poor or exceeded standards,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “But residents should be able to expect the people charged with protecting their public health to communicate with them on issues that impact their day-to-day lives.” He continued: “We are calling specifically on ACHD COO Patrick Dowd to take swift action to ensure ACHD develops a communications strategy that better informs residents about these H2S exceedances as well as short-term bouts of unhealthy air that threaten public health but do not meet the criteria for a Mon Valley Air Pollution Episode alert.” #H2S #hydrogensulfide #LibertyMonitor #MonValley #PatrickCampbell #hydrogensulfideexceedance #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #airqualitymonitor #ACHD #airquality

Good news, everybody: A recording is now available for our recent event, Making the Connection: The Alarming Link Between Pollution & Mental Health. For those who did not have this event on their radar: Our panel discussion featured the award-winning local investigative journalists – Julie Grant of The Allegheny Front and Kristina Marusic of Environmental Health News – who authored an explosive series exploring the connection between air pollution and mental illness. Their investigation into the mental health impacts of air and water pollution in western Pennsylvania found alarming evidence that residents throughout the region are likely suffering changes to their brains due to pollution in the surrounding environment. The reporting also uncovered the growing gap in mental health care as more people are traumatized by worsening climate change. But we’ll let them tell you more. Check it out: Editor’s Note: You can – and should – check those stories out here. Powerful stuff! #airpollutionandmentalhealth #airpollution #makingtheconnection #WESA #EnvironmentalHealthNews #KristinaMarusic #airquality

Allegheny County Health Department (ACHD) in December 2021 provided its yearly analysis and summary of air quality monitoring data, posting to its website the 2020 Annual Air Quality Report. This report “reflects air quality as sampled and validated by ACHD through the 2020 calendar year.” The 44-page document, which was published without fanfare, can be read in its entirety here. Reading about 2020 air quality in 2022 might seem dated or obsolete but this report is worth checking out. Why? Simply put, it is ACHD’s most comprehensive look at air quality data. The report provides the previous year’s data and 20-year trends. For pollutant standards that require averages over consecutive years, multi-year averages are given. Exceedances are also given for the monitored pollutants. (For those who may be unfamiliar: An exceedance is a concentration that goes above a standard but does not necessarily constitute a “violation” of a standard. For some standards, a violation is a collection of several exceedances over a multi-year period.) Here is a summary of exceedances for federal standards provided in the report: Although there are no federal standards for hydrogen sulfide, Pennsylvania standards for protection against odor nuisances are 0.1 ppm on a one-hour basis and 0.005 ppm on a 24-hour average basis. The report indicates that in 2020, Pennsylvania’s 24-hour H2S average concentration was exceeded on 25 days at the Liberty monitor. There were two other such exceedances at the North Braddock monitor. “While we noted that ACHD Director Dr. Bogan mentioned the availability of the report at the latest Board of Health meeting, its quiet release is another example of how department leadership fails to adequately prioritize communications with residents about air quality issues,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “Sharing this report with commentary would help residents better understand the data and its public health implications. We encourage ACHD to be a little louder with these sorts of informative materials in the future.” #airqualityexceedances #PM25 #H2S #H2Sexceedance #hydrogensulfide #DrDebraBogen #alleghenycountyairquality #particulatematter #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #ACHD #airquality

Sadly, if you live in the Mon Valley, this likely isn’t news: Air quality was terrible early Saturday, with AirNow.gov showing “unhealthy” NowCast AQI values that were – for a time – the worst in the nation. Users took to the CMU CREATE Lab’s SmellPGH app to share their complaints and concerns, describing physical symptoms like nausea, headaches, scratchy throats, and respiratory trouble. One user noted the lack of action from the Allegheny County Health Department (ACHD), writing, “You are ruining our quality of life.” Many, many others lamented the overpowering stench. The culprits? Air quality monitor data showed elevated concentrations of many pollutants Saturday but undoubtedly hydrogen sulfide (H2S) – a flammable, colorless gas produced during the coke-making process (among other things) that smells like rotten eggs – played a part. Exposure to low concentrations of hydrogen sulfide may cause irritation to the eyes, nose, or throat. It may also cause difficulty in breathing for some asthmatics. The EPA says exposure to low concentrations of hydrogen sulfide may also cause headaches, poor memory, tiredness, and balance problems. People usually can smell hydrogen sulfide at concentrations as low as 0.0005 parts per million. Concentrations exceeded that threshold handily on Saturday. In fact, the H2S concentration at Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in Liberty Borough averaged 0.007 ppm over the full day. That exceeds Pennsylvania’s 24-hour average limit of 0.005 ppm. Saturday marked the fourth exceedance so far this year at the Liberty monitor. For those trying to keep track: H2S concentrations at the Liberty monitor exceeded the Pennsylvania 24-hour average standard 54 times last year – which was more than twice 2020’s numbers. There were 18 other such exceedances at Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in North Braddock Borough. Despite the regularity with which these exceedances occur and our regular calls to action asking ACHD to do better when it comes to communicating the issue with residents, Chief Operating Officer Patrick Dowd and health department leadership have so far refused to weigh in on the issue publicly. We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again now: We don’t know why ACHD has refused to be more transparent on this issue. “Their silence is telling residents plenty,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “We are again asking Mr. Dowd to do everything in his power as chief operating officer to create a more robust communications plan for the air quality program.” What do we know about what might be causing all these H2S exceedances? We know that ACHD issued an H2S-related enforcement action against U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works in April 2021 (as well as an associated press release), but unfortunately, no other details have since been provided to the public. “These H2S exceedances and bouts of unhealthy air happen too frequently for residents to hear nothing from health officials,” Campbell said. #H2S #airpollution #MonValleyairquality #hydrogensulfide #USSteel #MonValley #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #ACHD #ClairtonCokeWorks #USSteelClairtonCokeWorks #airquality

The Allegheny County Health Department (ACHD) has issued a notice of applicability to Magnus Productions, telling the company that it must comply with the recently approved Mon Valley Air Pollution Episode Rules. Here’s what happened: ACHD on Jan. 27 issued an amended permit to the company for the operation of the former Braddock Recovery facility at U.S. Steel’s Edgar Thomson plant, making it subject to the new rules. The company has until April 27 to submit plans – one for the watch phase and one for the warning phase – detailing how it will reduce its generation of both fine and coarse particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10 respectively) in the event of an air pollution event. Never heard of Magnus Productions? The company operates Braddock Recovery, Inc., which is located on U.S. Steel’s Edgar Thompson Plant site. This facility receives waste products from U.S. Steel, including furnace flue dust, slag and sludge, mill scale, and coke fines, dries them in a rotary kiln fired with coke oven gas, combines them with lime, cement, sodium silicate, water, bentonite, and molasses in a wet mixing process in two pugmills, and forms the moist mix into briquettes. These finished briquettes are piled on-site with a radial stacker and then loaded onto railcars and sent back to US Steel to be used in the furnaces. Magnus Productions is the 17th facility to be subject to the new Mon Valley Air Pollution Episode rules. Just last week, ACHD announced that it had approved the plans submitted by 10 operators required to comply with the Mon Valley Air Pollution Episode rules and rejected six others – including those for U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works and Edgar Thomson facilities. You can read more about why ACHD rejected U.S. Steel’s mitigation plans on our blog. Just as a reminder about those rules: The Mon Valley Episode Rule is an addition to the local Air Pollution Control Regulations and was signed into law in September 2021 by Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald to develop and implement a system to respond to weather-related inversions in the Mon Valley, which can result in episodes of high levels of particulate matter pollution that can impact public health, exacerbating conditions like asthma and cardiovascular disease. Under the rule, air quality staff monitors pollution forecasts for conditions that could lead to an episode. When conditions are likely to exceed acceptable levels for the Mon Valley, sources are required to follow approved mitigation plans to reduce their emissions. An Air Pollution Watch is issued when weather conditions are forecast to cause a high concentration of particulates in the Mon Valley, and an Air Pollution Warning is issued when the exceedance occurs and is expected to continue for 24 hours. The rule applies to sources within or near the following municipalities: Braddock, Braddock Hills, Chalfant, Clairton, Dravosburg, Duquesne, East McKeesport, East Pittsburgh, Elizabeth Borough, Elizabeth Township, Forest Hills, Forward, Glassport, Jefferson Hills, Liberty, Lincoln, McKeesport, Munhall, North Braddock, North Versailles, Port Vue, Rankin, Swissvale, Turtle Creek, Versailles, Wall, West Elizabeth, West Mifflin, White Oak, Wilkins, Wilmerding and Whitaker. The department communicates these warnings and watches to the public through the Allegheny Alerts system. Users can choose to receive these communications via email, text, and/or phone call. To sign up go here. Editor’s Note: Click here to read a guidance document ACHD has provided to facilities subject to the rule. #MonValleyAirPollution #MagnusProductions #USSteel #MonValleyWarning #MonValleyWatch #EdgarThomsonWorks #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #ACHD #ClairtonCokeWorks #MonValleyAirPollutionEpisodeRule #airquality

As we predicted, Pennsylvania’s participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) has become the subject of litigation. According to reports from the Associated Press, Pennsylvania’s Legislative Reference Bureau has failed to publish the regulations that would implement RGGI in the Pennsylvania Bulletin, which would have been the final step to put the regulations into effect. “It is not at all clear how the Legislative Reference Bureau could claim to have the authority to refuse to publish approved regulations,” GASP senior attorney John Baillie said. Consequently, the Secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection Patrick McDonnell filed an action last week in the Commonwealth Court on behalf of the Wolf Administration to compel the Legislative Reference Bureau to publish the regulations. We will continue to provide updates as this litigation progresses.

GASP just last week called on ACHD to make the documents public so that residents could see for themselves how the polluters in their neighborhoods plan to deal reduce particulate matter emissions during short-term air pollution events. “We want to thank Allegheny County Health Department for making these plans available for public consumption,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “Transparency is paramount when it comes to accountability.” Here’s what ACHD tweeted last night: UPDATE: The plans submitted to the Health Department by sources that are subject to the Mon Valley Episode Rule are now online: https://t.co/V2w8dNPlHo https://t.co/IsOgimJW6m — Allegheny County Health Department (@HealthAllegheny) February 7, 2022 GASP staff is currently reviewing the documents. For those who need a little bit of background info: The Mon Valley Episode Rule, an addition to the County Air Pollution Control Regulations, was signed into law in September 2021 by Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald to develop and implement a system to respond to weather-related inversions in the Mon Valley, which can result in episodes of high levels of particulate matter pollution (PM2.5). Under the rule, ACHD monitors pollution forecasts for conditions that could lead to an episode. When conditions are likely to exceed acceptable levels for the Mon Valley, sources are required to follow approved mitigation plans to reduce their emissions. An Air Pollution Watch is issued when weather conditions are forecast to cause a high concentration of particulates in the Mon Valley, and an Air Pollution Warning is issued when the exceedance occurs and is expected to continue for 24 hours. The rule applies to certain sources within or near the following municipalities: Braddock, Braddock Hills, Chalfant, Clairton, Dravosburg, Duquesne, East McKeesport, East Pittsburgh, Elizabeth Borough, Elizabeth Township, Forest Hills, Forward, Glassport, Jefferson Hills, Liberty, Lincoln, McKeesport, Munhall, North Braddock, North Versailles, Port Vue, Rankin, Swissvale, Turtle Creek, Versailles, Wall, West Elizabeth, West Mifflin, White Oak, Wilkins, Wilmerding, and Whitaker. Notifications and alerts will be sent out using Allegheny Alerts. To sign up, go here. #airpollution #MonValleyAirPollution #USSteel #MonValleyWarning #MonValleyWatch #AlleghenyCounty #alleghenycountyairquality #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #ACHD #ClairtonCokeWorks #MonValleyAirPollutionEpisodeRule #airquality

Media Contact: Amanda Gillooly Communications Manager Group Against Smog and Pollution (GASP) amanda@gasp-pgh.org FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE GASP Announces Election of Five New Board Members The Group Against Smog and Pollution (GASP) is delighted to announce the election of five new members to its board of directors, adding valuable experience and expertise to the watchdog group’s team. The new members, who will serve three-year terms, include: Shawn C. Dalton, who is a fellow with Human Impacts Institute, where she is involved with its Stories of a Just Transition Pittsburgh. She previously served 10 years as an environmental board member and certified advocate with One Pittsburgh, now One PA. She also volunteered with Sierra Club’s Ready for 100 campaign. Shawn has an associate’s degree in accounting and more than a decade of experience working within marginalized communities. Kelly Henderson, who is the co-founder and co-owner of Just By Nature, a Pittsburgh-based environmental justice consulting firm, as well as the K-12 Education Coordinator and adjunct faculty member at Chatham University’s Eden Hall Campus. She previously worked for both the Green Building Alliance and Venture Outdoors. Henderson earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from Colgate University as well as master’s degrees in teaching from Chatham University and science in sustainable energy systems from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Greg Kochanski, who is a senior software engineer at Google who previously worked at AT&T and Lucent Technologies. Previously, he worked as a visiting researcher for Rutgers University and a senior research fellow at the University of Oxford. Kochanski earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Chie Togami, who is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Pittsburgh, where she serves as a graduate student assistant at Pitt’s World History Center. She’s earned myriad fellowships and awards for everything from collaborative research to excellence in teaching and serves on the board of Quaker Voluntary Service. In 2021, she collaborated with GASP and Pitt’s World History Center to create “Extraction,” a three-part podcast that examines the 120-year history of U.S. Steel Corp. and the people and places that figure deeply into this company’s environmental and social legacy. Togami earned her bachelor’s degree in environmental policy from Williams College and received her master’s degree in sociology from the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Noe Woods, who is an obstetrician/gynecologist at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital and  serves as an assistant professor of ob-gyn at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She also works with the Birmingham Free Clinic, which provides medical care to underserved communities. Additionally, Woods conducts research on the environmental impact of medicine and healthcare sustainability and recently earned a Climate Health Organizing Fellowship through Harvard University. Woods earned her undergraduate degree from Cornell University and her medical degree from Temple University. She completed her residency at the University of Vermont. GASP Board President Jonathan Nadle said he is thrilled the board has grown by five members – increasing the board size by a little more than a third. “The new board members are jumping in feet first, already taking an active role in furthering our work of cleaning up the Pittsburgh region’s air, involving more communities, and increasing GASP’s effectiveness,” he said. “We are fortunate to have new members from a diversity of backgrounds who bring an array of knowledge and skills. We look forward to our expanded board tackling the issues we all care about deeply.” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell agreed. “The experience, knowledge, and passion that our new board members bring to the team is just awesome,” he said. “I look forward to working with them to make 2022 the most impactful year yet for GASP.” GASP is a nonprofit citizens’ group in Southwestern PA working for a healthy, sustainable environment. Founded in 1969, GASP has been a diligent watchdog, educator, litigator, and policy-maker on environmental issues, with a focus on air quality in the Pittsburgh region. ### #JonathanNadle #GregKochanski #air #KellyHenderson #ChieTogami #ShawnDalton #NoeWoods #airquality

Wednesday marked the fifth time so far this year that levels of hydrogen sulfide (AKA H2S, an air pollutant distinguished by its rotten-egg odor) exceeded the state’s 24-hour average standard at Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in Liberty Borough. Preliminary data also show that while concentrations of H2S were also elevated at ACHD’s air quality monitor in North Braddock, the 24-hour average was close to – but just short of – an exceedance. Local residents confronted by yesterday’s stench took to CMU CreateLab’s SmellPgh app to detail how industrial and rotten-egg odors were potent enough to seep in through their closed windows and wake them from sleep. They also described physical symptoms like sore throats, asthma flareups, headaches, nausea, congestion, and more. But H2S wasn’t the only pollutant impacting the Mon Valley yesterday: Concentrations of fine particulate matter, a harmful air pollutant known as PM2.5 were also elevated during the early part of the day – contributing to an Air Quality Index (AQI) that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) classifies as unhealthy for everyone. For several hours Wednesday, the Liberty-Clairton’s AQI was the worst in the country (again), according to AirNow.gov’s NowCast: (Quick aside: Fine particulate pollution is harmful to human health because it’s smaller and more able to infiltrate the body through the nose, mouth, and skin. This means they can travel deep into the lungs and even into the bloodstream. PM2.5 is linked to heart attacks, strokes, arrhythmias, and lung cancers. Exposure to PM2.5 is also linked to everything from baldness to dementia to mental illness.) “While concentrations of fine particulate matter were concerning but didn’t rise to the levels of triggering a Mon Valley Air Pollution Warning, yesterday was still a rough one for many residents in the Mon Valley because of poor air quality,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “A quick look at the SmellPgh app shows there was a short-term air pollution episode occurring that was impacting people’s health and quality of life. We think on these days, residents should be able to expect communications from the public health officials charged with helping protect their – our – wellbeing. But ACHD leadership again failed in this regard.” While no communications were issued regarding the abysmal air quality, ACHD did post an air dispersion forecast that indicated residents could expect AQI in the healthy range, warning only that “PM2.5 concentrations will be highest in the morning hours.” “We’re concerned about the disparity between what ACHD forecasted and included in its report and what residents actually experienced,” Campbell said. “GASP hopes that health department leaders see yesterday’s poor air episode as we do: A powerful example of why residents and advocates like GASP have been requesting more health-based information during these short-term periods of unhealthy air quality that do not rise to the occasion of a Mon Valley Watch or Warning.” So GASP is again asking ACHD Chief Operating Officer Patrick Dowd and his leadership team at the health department to better communicate with residents during these types of air pollution episodes that threaten public health but do not meet the criteria for a Mon Valley Air Pollution Episode alert and address the ongoing H2S exceedances. Editor’s Note: H2S concentrations at the Liberty monitor exceeded the Pennsylvania 24-hour average standard 54 times last year – which was more than twice 2020’s numbers. Here’s a chart detailing the H2S exceedances so far this year: #PM25 #H2S #airpollution #hydrogensulfide #AlleghenyCountyHealthDeparment #MonValley #hydrogensulfideexceedance #particulatematter #ACHD #airquality

Editor’s Note: This blog was updated at 10:35 a.m. Feb. 23 to include an updated H2S chart. Users of CMU CreateLab’s crowd-sourcing app SmellPG reported the usual odors – saying the pungent air that seeped in through their windows last night and this morning was reminiscent of rotten eggs. Some said it was a strong sulfur smell. Others called it “industrial.” The possible culprit could be the elevated concentrations of hydrogen sulfide that have pervaded the Mon Valley Monday and today. How bad has it been? Concentrations of H2S (known by its distinct rotten egg odor) at Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in Liberty Borough were so high today that by 9 a.m. an exceedance of Pennsylvania’s 24-hour average was already guaranteed. There was also an exceedance at the Liberty monitor Monday – making it seven so far this year. While there have been no exceedances at ACHD’s air quality monitor in North Braddock yet in 2022, concentrations of H2S were just under that threshold both Sunday and Monday. If you are unfamiliar with H2S, it’s important to note that exposure to low concentrations may cause irritation to the eyes, nose, or throat. It may also cause difficulty in breathing for some asthmatics. The EPA says exposure to low concentrations of hydrogen sulfide may also cause headaches, poor memory, tiredness, and balance problems. But H2S wasn’t the only air pollutant of concern Monday and today when PM2.5 concentrations were high enough to drive the AQI in the Liberty-Clairton area into the unhealthy ranges Monday. Indeed, the AQI was high enough to land the area at the top of the list of places with the worst air quality in the United States. Levels of sulfur dioxide (SO2) were also elevated, with a peak one-hour value of 70 ppb Monday. By way of background: The 70 ppb level we saw yesterday wasn’t over any regulatory limit but it is the highest concentration of SO2 at Liberty we’ve seen since Dec. 26, 2019. While GASP thanks ACHD for issuing an update on air quality, we hope they will consider being more proactive in the future and provide more health-based information to help residents mitigate their exposure to air pollutants. “We hope they will consider adding information about these ongoing H2S exceedances that impact residents’ health and quality of life,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “Residents deserve to know what the officials charged with protecting their health are doing to address this issue.” The Mon Valley is experiencing a weather inversion. The 24-hour rolling average at the Liberty monitor is between 50-100 on the Air Quality Index (AQI); we have not exceeded federal AQ standards and do not expect to, but the AQ team continues to closely monitor conditions. pic.twitter.com/QSdZV52aY4 — Allegheny County Health Department (@HealthAllegheny) February 22, 2022 GASP wants to note that today’s H2S exceedance was guaranteed mere hours before the Allegheny County Health Department’s public hearing regarding Clairton Coke’s draft operating permit. For those who might not be aware: U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works is a major emitter of H2S in Allegheny County. While it’s too late to sign up to speak at tonight’s hearing, ACHD confirmed to GASP Monday that the event would be live-streamed on the department’s Facebook page. GASP will be in attendance tonight to testify. Check back – we’ll post our comments and information from the hearing on our blog. #H2S #MonValleyairquality #H2Sexceedance #hydrogensulfide #USSteel #airqualityexceedance #MonValley #emissions #AlleghenyCountyHealthDepartment #ACHD #ClairtonCokeWorks #airquality