Climate and clean energy laws and programs being implemented throughout the U.S. present many opportunities to directly benefit communities that are overburdened by air pollution. The passage of the federal Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, in particular, present historic opportunities to reduce the fossil fuel emissions that are simultaneously heating up our planet and harming people’s health, particularly in communities near sources of air pollution. Government actions to curb greenhouse gas emissions can also reduce dangerous air pollution, but without policies designed to ensure equitable outcomes – paired with well-designed programs to measure and monitor changes in air pollution – not all communities are guaranteed to realize the benefits of climate and clean energy programs.

GCC’s Air Quality Monitoring Work

States Air Quality Monitoring Workgroup

Since 2020, the Georgetown Climate Center has convened officials from state energy, transportation, and environment agencies through the Air Quality Monitoring (AQM) Workgroup of Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states. The Workgroup, which includes participants from 10 states and the District of Columbia, supports states’ efforts to make sure that their climate policies and programs also meaningfully improve air quality and public health in the communities that have been hardest hit by air pollution. At the center of the Workgroup’s efforts is an emphasis on Community Based Air Quality Monitoring (CBAQM), which can provide detailed, localized information about the pollution people are currently exposed to where they live, and about how that pollution is changing over time as a result of new government policies and investments. The Workgroup focuses on facilitating state efforts to establish partnerships with communities and collaboratively design air monitoring programs that reflect community priorities and lead to real and lasting improvements in air quality and public health. 

Are you a state official working on air quality monitoring, air pollution or climate? For more information on GCC’s Air Quality Monitoring Workgroup, contact James Bradbury at james.bradbury@georgetown.edu.

GCC’s Community-Based Air Quality Monitoring Resources

Community-Based Air Quality Monitoring Framework

To support successful implementation of CBAQM projects and programs, GCC worked with TD Environmental Services and state environmental agency officials to create a framework consisting of information and resources for any stage of CBAQM project development, from conception to implementation.

This framework will help project leaders develop community-based air quality monitoring projects in collaboration with local partners, including organizations working in neighborhoods or areas overburdened by air pollution. Community-based air quality monitoring presents an opportunity to build stronger, more collaborative relationships between governments and overburdened communities, through community input and by establishing infrastructure for greater transparency and accountability around key decision-making processes. View the framework here.

Additional Resources

Additional CBAQM resources GCC has developed in collaboration with states: 

• Issue Brief: How Community-Based Air Quality Monitoring Can Make Climate Policy More Equitable
• Letter to EPA making the agency aware of the collaborative states' Air Quality Monitoring Workgroup
• Comment to the EPA on improving air quality monitoring in overburdened communities

About Air Quality Monitoring and Climate Change

What are the connections between climate change, air pollution, and health? 

In addition to producing climate warming greenhouse gases, air pollution from burning fossil fuels causes premature deaths and a wide range of negative health effects, like heart and lung disease, low birth weight, and reduced lung function and asthma in children. As we transition away from fossil fuels as part of the global effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to combat climate change, the resulting improvements in air quality can also result in fewer deaths and better health.

Over 100 million Americans live in communities with air pollution levels higher than the EPA’s health-based air quality standards, but this environmental health burden is not shared equally. 

Overburdened communities, which include minority, low-income, tribal, or indigenous populations or geographic locations in the United States that potentially experience disproportionate environmental harms and risks, are often left out of public participation and left behind in national advances in environmental health.

How can community-based air quality monitoring help?

Community based air quality monitoring (CBAQM) presents an opportunity to help advance environmental justice goals, including the Justice 40 initiative, and other programs aiming to direct the benefits of public investments toward historically disadvantaged and overburdened communities. To identify and prioritize benefits for communities where pollution reduction and investments are most needed, policymakers and communities need reliable data about, among other things, the locations where current pollution levels are highest. Furthermore, once new climate programs are in place and infrastructure investments have occurred, the public should be able to track whether those investments are resulting in cleaner air in the places where people live, learn, work, and play.

The implementation of CBAQM projects can also provide a forum for building stronger, more collaborative relationships between governments and overburdened communities, by providing opportunities for community input and by establishing infrastructure for greater transparency and accountability around key decision-making processes.

For more information about how CBAQM can be used to benefit overburdened communities and inform lawmakers, checkout GCC’s Issue Brief: How Community-Based Air Quality Monitoring Can Make Climate Policy More Equitable.

What is the connection between federal investments and local air monitoring? 

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and other federal legislation have made available game-changing resources for CBAQM and other community-driven solutions to climate change. The federal government and a growing number of states have committed to making sure that overburdened communities receive a significant share of the benefits from infrastructure investments and other programs. The Biden Administration’s Justice40 Initiative, in particular, commits that no less than 40 percent of the benefits of investments made through certain climate and clean energy programs will go to “disadvantaged communities”.

In November 2022, 132 projects throughout 37 states received a total of $53.4 million in grants from EPA specifically for community air quality monitoring. Selected projects involve partnerships among a wide range of organizations that will collaborate on installing sensors, creating air quality measurement networks, and increasing awareness in communities.

As a result of the unprecedented scale of new federal funding for air quality monitoring, coupled with commitments by political leaders to improve conditions for “environmental justice communities,” overburdened communities – and the public, at large – could soon have a much better understanding of how pollution is affecting them. 

The Georgetown Climate Center convenes the Air Quality Monitoring Workgroup of Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states to help support state efforts to seize this critical opportunity to establish partnerships with communities and build capacities that could lead to real and lasting policy solutions.Drawing on insights from workgroup discussions, GCC submitted a comment to the EPA outlining how air quality monitoring projects are designed and implemented in ways that meaningfully address community needs. 

Cover image: New York State staff discuss local air quality monitoring with students in STEP (Science and Technology Entry Program).