Image by Tom from Pixabay
This project aims to support the City of Beloit community in assessing local air quality within vulnerable communities. With low-cost, PurpleAir monitors loaned from the EPA, we are measuring particulate matter air quality in six locations within Beloit, a city situated southeast of a recently expanded gas-fueled power plant. With sensor host partnerships including local government, community services, schools, and neighborhoods we aim to not only monitor air quality, but also to engage, co- educate, and empower local community members to understand the health risks and to serve as an advocate for providing resources that mitigate poor air quality. We are engaged with an AP Environmental Science class, helping with data acquisition, and hope to engage in local ‘town-hall style’ forums in the future. Finally, we plan to draft any results and share them, to emphasize the need for us to protect the Beloit community residents.
Over the last decade, energy companies in Wisconsin have been shutting down coal power generation plants and replacing a select few with higher-energy generation, combined-natural gas plants. Statewide climate-related goals (Executive Order No. 38) intend to help WI energy companies cut carbon emissions by 80% by 2050 (WI public radio) by transitioning away from coal-burning toward natural gas and renewable energy sources. Although natural gas plants generally reduce carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur and mercury pollutant emissions, they have other reported environmental and health-related consequences (Fouladi Fard et al 2016). For example, burning natural gas for fuel results in elevated release of methane, which some consider to be a far more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 (Alvarez et al 2012). Additionally, some communities have seen concentration-dependent increases in hospitalizations and daily admissions based on age and proximity to the plant (Di Ciaula et al 2011). Although, in some cases where energy produced did not increase, members of the community saw improvements in long-term asthma outcomes (Casey et al 2020). Nonetheless, experts are calling for deeper considerations into the health and environmental damage in concert with expanded emission control, particularly in cases of plant expansions (Fouladi Fard et al 2016).
However, the damaging effects of gas-fueled power plants are not felt equally across human populations. In fact, locations chosen for energy production disproportionately impact low-income, elder, and predominantly non-white and indigenous communities (EPA). This is the case for the City of Beloit, Wisconsin, a predominantly non-white community that classifies as low-income, relative to the national averages (EPA EJAScreening Tool). The city of Beloit sits just south of Alliant Energy’s West Riverside Energy Center (WERC), a recently converted coal-to-natural gas power plant. Alliant Energy serves more than 960,000 users in WI and IOWA (WI public radio); one of which, WERC, has increased their energy production threefold to meet the demand of powering an additional 550,000 homes to compensate for coal plants being phased out of service. Although these conversion efforts could stem from current Governor Tony Evers’s Executive Order #38 “Relating to Clean Energy in Wisconsin“ (link), which calls for energy consumed in the state of Wisconsin to be carbon free by 2050, there has been minimal to no effort placed in understanding the disproportionate impacts that some communities, like Beloit, may already be facing.
With a small investment of time, we were able to use the EPA Clean Air Market’s (link) data user section, along with embedded data mapping tool, EJSCREEN to compare demographics from communities in close proximity to natural-gas power plants, relative to the national average. The screening and mapping tool aims to highlight places with vulnerable communities or greater environmental burdens. Note, The demographic information is obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) 2014-2018 5-year summary file data, which is based on 2018 census boundaries. Overall, the number of power plants in communities that fall at or above the 80th percentile nationally, appear to be disproportionately located in key demographic communities such as: low-income, people of color, less than high school education, linguistic isolation, individuals under 5 years and above 64 years of age (Fig 1). Specific to the Beloit area, mapping overlays for socioeconomic indicators demonstrate that the surrounding communities are made up predominantly by communities of color and low income individuals, relative to national percentiles (Figure 2). Indeed, most of the shading in Figure 2 (A) indicates that communities within Beloit often fall above the 60-70th percentiles, with some as high as the 80th percentile. Similarly, in part (B) of Figure 2, orange and red shading (90-95 and 95-100th percentile, respectively) indicates that this area is not only one of the poorest in Wisconsin, but also nationally. The need to protect the community members residing in this area is clear, however, little to no work has been done to investigate the effects of the newly converted power plant. Therefore, we aim to investigate potential harmful particulate materials released from the power plant, and draft a “potential impact report” to the WI DNR. Additionally, we aim to engage, co- educate, and empower local community members to understand the health risks and to serve as an advocate for providing resources that may mitigate poor localized air quality.
To date, there has been minimal effort aimed at investigating the extent to which residents from sensitive populations within Beloit are exposed to elevated levels of airborne particulate matter. The proposed project leads are interested in addressing the following questions:
Air Quality Sensors: We have been approved to borrow 6 PurpleAir PA-II air quality sensors by the EPA Region 5 Air Sensor Loan Program (link) for 6 months (with a possibility to extend).
Sensor Hosts: We have located sensor host partners in multiple organizations that are utilized by members of vulnerable communities. Since September, we have installed and/or registered purple air sensors at the following locations:
Installation with the AP Environmental Science class from Beloit Memorial High School. Photo by Alisha Saley.
Community Lead, Brittany (L) meets with Angelina Reyes (R) from Merrill Community Center to install a sensor. Photo by Alisha Saley.
If you are interested in checking out the data that is being collected so far, you can find it live at: Real-Time Air Quality Map, Beloit WI.
Dr. Brittany Keyes, Local Politician, Former Beloit City Council Vice President
Dr. Brittany Keyes is a physical therapist who lives in Beloit, WI with her husband and two young children. She recently served as the Vice President of Beloit’s City Council where she became aware of the impacts of pollution on the more vulnerable members of her community. She is dedicated to service, volunteering on the board for the Rotary Club of Beloit and the board for Wisconsin Health Professionals for Climate Action.
Dr. Pablo Toral, Professor of Environmental Studies and International Relations, conducts research on sustainable development, with a focus on community-level environmental activism.
Pablo lives in Beloit, where he has been an advocate for initiatives that promote sustainability. He works with several community organizations and currently serves in the City of Beloit’s Plan Commission.
Abby Novinska-Lois, Executive Director of Wisconsin Professionals for Climate Action
Abby received her bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science (cert. in Environmental Studies) from the UW- Madison and is currently pursuing a Masters in Public Health. She has worked across various scales of climate and environmental justice and currently splits her time between the Global Health Institute and the Wisconsin Health Professionals for Climate Action (WHPCA), where she is the executive director. After some local health professionals alerted WHPCA to potential air quality issues in Beloit, she reached out to Thriving Earth Exchange and submitted a project for the April 2022 cohort.
We are partnering with the Air Monitoring team at the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources to aid in data calibration along with an outside air quality scientist (finalizing) for results interpretation and dissemination products.
Alisha Saley, PhD Candidate in the Ecology Graduate Group, UC- Davis
Alisha (she|her) is a marine ecology PhD candidate at the University of California-Davis (Bodega Marine Laboratory). From Wisconsin, she received her undergraduate education from the UW- La Crosse. She is broadly interested in how co-learning and capacity building strategies can strengthen the impact of research effort. Joining the team as a project manager allows her to continue to move science beyond the walls of academia, outside of her field of study.
We are seeking an external air quality scientist, someone with background experience in particulate matter pollutants, gas-burning energy generation, and/or meteorological modeling at the city-scale. We currently have a prospective science team that will participate in data quality checks, but are hoping to find a partner who is eager to interpret and disseminate the work, in the context of human health risks. With the addition of an expert, our group is motivated to apply for more funding, if needed, moving forward. If you are interested in participating as a scientist or technical expert, please see this document and contact Alisha ([email protected]) to set up a call.
Sensor Loan Program: (Air Sensor Loan Programs | US EPA)
EPA’s Region 5 loaned us 6 portable particulate matter (PM) sensors. The loan program aims to empower public engagement and knowledge acquisition, to inspire positive change to public health by collecting air quality data. Our team goals follow in line with this mission, and hope to instill the same effects in the city of Beloit, WI. We are especially grateful to Saphique Thomas, for her guidance and assistance in the application stage.
Guidance from Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR):
We are grateful to the WI DNR for providing the locally-derived correction factor for the PurpleAir sensors and for thoughtful discussions on past and present air quality management in WI.
