Air Quality Facts

Ozone Background:

• Ozone is created when heat and sunlight react with hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides that are emitted by automobiles, auto body shops, gas stations, organic solvents, and dozens of other sources. When all these mix, they form a ground-level layer of ozone, also known as smog.
• Ozone in the upper atmosphere protects the earth from ultraviolet radiation. Ozone in the lower atmosphere, where we breathe, is a pollutant.
• The effects of ozone are most dangerous for people with asthma or other lung disease, children and the elderly. But even healthy individuals can feel the effects when the air quality is at its worst, particularly when exercising or exerting themselves.

Health Statistics

• When inhaled, even at very low levels, ozone can:
  • Cause acute respiratory problems
  • Aggravate asthma
  • Cause a 14-20 percent decrease in lung capacity for healthy adults
  • Cause inflammation of lung tissue
  • Lead to hospital admissions and emergency room visits
  • Impair the body's immune system defenses, making more people susceptible
     to respiratory illnesses, including bronchitis and pneumonia.
• The estimated health cost of air pollution is $50 billion each year!
• Children are most at risk from exposure to ozone because their lungs are still developing and they breathe more rapidly and inhale more air pollution per pound of body weight than adults. They also often breathe through their mouths, which mean the pollution bypasses the body's first line of defense: the nose.
• Asthma prevalence has increased by more than 75 percent in the last 12 years and is the leading chronic illness among children.
• St. Louis City and County have the highest rate of asthma hospitalizations and emergency room visits in Missouri.
• According to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, there are approximately 140,000 adults with asthma in the St. Louis Metro region.
• Some areas of St. Louis are estimated to have 15-20% of children who suffer from asthma, and up to 50% of children experience some type of asthma-like wheezing or chronic cough.

Transportation and Ozone Facts

• St. Louisans make more than six million vehicle trips each day. Of these trips, five million are single-occupancy vehicle trips.
• People in St. Louis drive over 72 million miles every day, producing over 88 tons of ozone forming VOC emissions daily!
• According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, although air quality has greatly improved, vehicles on the road account for at least 29% of air pollution emissions nationwide (29% of volatile organic compounds, 34% of nitrogen oxides and 51% of carbon monoxide).
• In 2003, The Texas Transportation Institute's annual mobility study found that St. Louis-area motorists spent a combined 40 million hours in traffic, wasted 26 million gallons of fuel and doled out $675 million because of traffic congestion.
• One person riding in a Vanpool/Carpool instead of a car can save the environment 9.1 pounds of harmful emissions every year!
• The average commuter can save about $1,500 per year by sharing the ride instead of driving alone to work.
• A single highway lane can accommodate 2,250 people per hour in cars and 9,000 people per hour in buses!
• Two MetroLink tracks have the same capacity as 16 lanes of highway!
• A full MetroBus at rush hour removes 40 cars from the highway, and a full MetroLink train at rush hour removes 125 cars from the highway.
• Commuters can contact any of the following to link up with a carpool, vanpool or try MetroBus or MetroLink.
  
  ­ American Lung Association at (314) 645-5505, www.lungusa.org
  ­ Metro (MO) (314) 231-2345, (IL) (618) 271-2345, www.metrostlouis.org
  ­ Madison County Transit (618) 931-7433, www.mct.org
  ­ RideFinders 1-800-VIP-RIDE, www.ridefinders.org
  ­ Citizens for Modern Transit (314) 231-7272, www.cmt-stl.org

Miscellaneous

• Operation of a gasoline-powered lawn mower for one hour is equal to driving a new car between 200 and 300 miles from an air pollution perspective.
• If every household postpones their gas-powered lawn gardening on RED DAYS, we would save 25 tons of toxic air pollutant emissions each day!
• Every day the vapor recovery systems at St. Louis gasoline stations help to prevent more than 11 tons of ozone-forming gasoline vapors from entering the air. These vapors are equal to the weight of 10 sub-compact cars!

Click here to learn about the health effects of the ozone.

About Air Pollution Subcategories

Air Pollution Basics
• What is Ozone?
• Sources of Ozone
• Ozone Formation

Air Quality Facts

Health Effects of Ozone
• St. Louis Population with
Lung Disease
• How Healthy Adults are
Affected by Ozone
• Tips for Exercisers
• Ozone & Hospital
Admissions

Particulate Matter

Local Air Quality
• St. Louis Monitor Map

Air Quality Index

Air Quality Data