By Morgan King, WV CAG Climate and Energy Program Manager
A new bill threatens to silence citizen science. SB 575 would limit community air monitoring by invalidating data collected by local air sensors and threaten our democracy through legislative overreach. Most problematically, the bill prevents the judiciary from deciding whether or not data is valid, thus violating the expertise and powers of the judicial branch of government.Â
Community air monitoring plays a crucial role in engaging citizens and supplementing data gathered by government agencies including, the EPA and the DEP. Our grassroots approach to monitoring air quality empowers citizens with free-to-them sensors to measure particulate matter and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in their air. Our project uses PurpleAir monitors that share AQI data on a real-time map and sends text alerts when local AQI levels are unsafe.Â
This map and the data we gather are also used to fill in gaps in the DEP’s and EPA’s monitoring network, as evidenced by the use of PurpleAir data in EPA maps and tools, and was recently apparent during the wildfire season of 2023.Â
Now, industry lobbyists want to suppress progress on this community science project. The government should not waste resources on policing community monitoring programs that provide peace of mind to local citizens and a vetted supplement to the EPA’s data.
