Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — As the inversion was poised to build over much of northern Utah in the coming days, those who watch air quality for a living said they've observed improvements in conditions from just five years ago.
"The good news, I suppose, is over the years we have done a lot to try and decrease the amount of pollution that we generate," said Utah Division of Air Quality air monitoring manager Bo Call.
Call said improvements to cars, industry and awareness have resulted in inversion conditions building more gradually and with less intensity.
"It used to be that we could pretty much count on the pollution levels doubling every day," Call said. "The rate at which we will grow that pollution has been slower than it has been in the past, and so we hope that it will stay slow and it won't get as high."
Pollution levels reached into the "unhealthy for sensitive groups" category at times Monday and Tuesday in Salt Lake and Utah counties, and Wednesday was forecast to be a mandatory action day for the entire Wasatch Front.
Mandatory action days include restrictions on solid fuel burning devices and open burning. People are also asked to consolidate trips to reduce car use.
Call was uncertain when the inversion might break.
"Levels might go down a bit, but they're not going to clean out by any means, and so we'll be just back into it," Call said. "We might see something by the end of the week to wash it out, but we're really getting into the season."
Call said he had seen inversions last as long as 10 days to two weeks during the month of January.
He encouraged people to carpool and take other steps to reduce pollution.
"If we can add another couple of days on to how long it takes to get to that level, then that's a couple more days that the air is reasonably good," Call said. "Anytime we can leave our car in the driveway and carpool or take a bus or something like that, then we are helping with the problem."
