An Air Quality Alert for smoke has been issued by Puget Sound Clean Air Agency until 1200 PM PDT Saturday.
Wildfires burning in
Washington and Canada will continue to cause air quality to reach Unhealthy for
Sensitive Groups to Unhealthy levels for portions of King County and southern
Snohomish County.
Everyone, especially sensitive groups, should limit time spent outdoors, avoid strenuous activities outdoors, and choose light indoor activities.
For current and forecasted air quality conditions visit www.pscleanair.gov.
I have a question about what is seemingly a discrepancy between AQI readings from the same sensor. I live in Bridgeport. The sensor that is on this website is located at the high school. Right now it says 85 for us, but if I go to the purple air website (https://map.purpleair.com/air-quality-standards-us-epa-aqi?opt=%2F1%2Flp%2Fa10%2Fp604800%2FcC0#1/25/-30) and go to the same sensor on the high school, it says 115. I would say just looking out my window the 115 is more accurate, but what accounts for the substantially different numbers at the same time from the same sensor? Thanks for clearing this up!
ReplyDeleteA couple reasons: Purple Air sensors are known to overreport PM2.5 concentrations. To account for this, you can apply a conversion located in the upper left drop down menu of the Purple Air map. Where it says "Apply conversion" select "US EPA". That same drop down menu has an option for averaging period. Selecting "1 hour" is comparable to what government agencies report.
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