DRAPER, UT: Evening lights shine through as a temperature inversion traps and fills the Salt Lake valley with thick smog—of which ozone is one component. During a temperature inversion, cold air dense with pollutants from vehicles, wood burning, and industry, is trapped near the ground under a layer of warmer air, causing poor air quality. Severe inversions have plagued Utah's large cities for many years.
But while stratospheric ozone is protective, high levels of ground-level ozone are detrimental to vegetation, animals, and people, which is why the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency labels it a “ People with asthma, emphysema, or chronic bronchitis are especially at risk. Deaths from respiratory illnesses are more common in areas with high levels of ozone, according to the EPA.
“With spring and summers longer and hotter, I worry about how climate change will continue to affect my asthma,” Torres says. “What’s going to happen to a person like me?”and millions of lost work and school days in the past 50 years. These advances are now at risk of reversing, Porter says.