[Music] welcome to the Benton Franklin Council of governments air quality video series this is part two of episode one what is air quality quick introduction who are you and what do you do name is Bill Barlo and I previously worked with Ben Franklin Transit I just retired from there in February and I was the planning manager uh long career obviously when you're at the retirement age of working at every level of government in the United States except Federal and I look at climate change for example which I'm working on right now for sustainable Tri Cities I look at it in a very similar way to work that I had done on the nuclear freeze campaign while we were trying to limit the number of nuclear arms that were across the country and seeing the success in that just a Citizens movement that mobilized and made change I'm hoping we can do the same with [Music] climate what is air quality and how is the air quality of our region air quality really is I'm going to say in layman's terms it's pollution in the air uh it's the air we breathe so EPA measures it scientifically with a whole bunch of indicators actually and one of them is Ozone uh so with these measurements they are able to determine if things are getting worse for the environment or better in our region we happen to be we talk about Seasons spring summer uh autumn and winter but in fact I think we have a different season here in the Tri Cities and it's called Smoke season and smoke season is probably the most obvious pollution in our region how is air quality measured measured as particulate uh the ozone I'm a little fuzzy on the ozone but I relate to it as emissions from automobiles I know that part and it's the combust burning of the fossil fuels through a combustion engine which is pretty hot coming out the tailpipe and it rises because it's hotter and it is full of uh exhaust that is actually creating a bit more of a cloud within that envelope it's cutting down some of the Sun and without any wind to dissipate it or any rain to knock it back down to the Earth uh we get a collection of uh harmful ozone ozone's everywhere but harmful ozone trapped in that bubble around us air quality refers to the cleanliness of the air we breathe it is measured by the concentration of pollutants like particulate matter ozone nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide why is air quality important it's not just us human beings it's the animals it's their habitats it is across the board it's the same reason I think and and we see this more clearly water quality what if you compare water quality standards and requirements to air quality needs to be as clean as water if we can think of it that way and we're we're beginning to understand it and it's becoming a problem to where that's the kind of science that needs to be done but we're relying on the user to take care of it understanding air quality is the first step in protecting our health and environment thank you for watching episode one up next the impacts of poor air quality [Music]