- I am an individual who is building up a community group to combat wood burning in our hamlet.
- My organization includes other individuals and possibly will include businesses who are like minded against both winter-heating wood burning as well as indiscriminate summer fire pit wood burning. I have suffered two winter seasons now, and others who we hope to bring forward are suffering too because of a few inconsiderate folks in our densely packed hamlet that choose to pollute the air with their wood burning, showing no concern for those on the other end of the chimney or downwind from the fire pit. We want to have a data driven approach to regulation of wood burning in our community, and Purple Air data, combined with wind data from our home weather stations, and pictures and video of chimney and fire pit smoke, will make that possible.
- The project will raise community awareness of the importance of air quality for health, and show definitively with hard data when the air is best, and when it is suffering. Adding more sensors to gather data on wood burning is very important to me because my health suffers every time my house fills with smoke at the hands of the neighbors burning wood. Those others I have been sharing with also are intrigued by the unique ability of using this data to make our case to the local government about the need for regulation. We agree that we can use this proof to get the local government to consider ordinances to regulate wood burning in the hamlet proper. Just having a bunch of us show up at town meetings saying we are waking up choking on smoke is one thing, but being able to prove that, for instance, at 1:14 AM on Wednesday there was a spike of 174 on the AQI and for 15 minutes it was in the red and purple, lends immense credibility to our arguments and might help us ban wood burning altogether among our densely placed houses. This undertaking of using AQI sensor data to raise awareness of the dangers of wood smoke as documented on the EPA website (Health and Environmental Effects of Particulate Matter (PM) | US EPA) could set a precedent for other community activists looking to protect the environment on a micro level in their own communities. Combining the Purple Air AQI 2.5 numbers with data from our home weather stations that log wind speed and direction will allow us to pinpoint those polluting the air now, and later if we are fortunate enough with the help of AQI data proof to get regulations outlawing burning in close proximity, we can use the gathered data to enforce the regulations.
- I personally love my Zen I’ve owned the last 3 months, with its bright color coded lighting that gives instant feedback on air quality, and it surely is great advertising for Purple Air to all driving by, but as the most expensive sensor I would not expect you to want to give any as donations. For the project I think any of the outdoor models would be fine, preferably the ones that allow SD logging too so we can get at the data for building up reports for our outreach. If you could donate 3 sensors now, that
would be a big start and really put our town on the map for all to see, and would likely lead to people purchasing sensors for their properties too.
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