Pinehurst's Air Quality Attainment History

Awhile back the paper headlined “Pinehurst Air Quality Reaches Attainment”, but how did Pinehurst (and Kellogg, Wardner, Smelterville, Page, Kingston & Cataldo) get into Non-attainment?

Several years back I was approached by a County Commissioner who had difficulty believing the air quality in Pinehurst was considered unhealthy regarding a standard known as PM2.5 (very small particles of whatever). He asked me to look into this and see if I could find out why. I spent countless hours requesting and reviewing Idaho Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) records not shown to the public, without submitting a records request. I flooded their inboxes for more data. I shared virtually all of this data with the Commissioners who came to consider me their “air quality expert”. I am only a researcher who understood data & put together puzzle pieces.

“Attainment” is ALL about the value/number 12.0 (µg/m3, or micrograms per cubic meter) and the monitoring machines that determine the value. Initially, there was one type of monitor that measured this value; the EPA refers to is as “the gold standard” monitor because it is very accurate. (I will call it the original.) Over time, different machines were developed that were less expensive and gave hourly values and instant information, instead of daily averages. They were initially used for forecasting and issuing burn bans, but later became available as a replacement to the original monitor for regulatory purposes, such as determining whether an area is in attainment or not.

If these newer monitors are to be used for regulatory purposes, there are federal laws that dictate the amount of allowable variation between them and the original type. From June 2009-June 2010, the EPA did a nationwide comparison study between 2 of these newer monitors & the original monitors. Pinehurst had one of each and the original monitor (3 monitors), but the newer ones were not used for regulatory purposes. The EPA study determined that neither one of the two newer monitors met the federal requirements: in Pinehurst, in Idaho, or virtually anywhere in the United States.

Nationwide these two monitor types read between 2-5 (µg/m3) HIGHER than the original monitor. The EPA published a report to the public on these findings in December of 2010 and advised (DEQ) not to use either of these two newer monitors if an area was in danger of being in non-attainment. If any area was close to, but BELOW, the 12.0 and these monitors could then read 14-17 and the area would go into non-attainment. DEQ’s Dan Redline told Governor Otter in October of 2016 that Pinehurst has always been “on the fence” regarding attainment, even before the EPA dropped the statutory number from 15 down to 12. Unfortunately, Pinehurst fell off that fence and on the wrong side.

On January 1, 2011, DEQ went from using the original monitor in Pinehurst for determining daily attainment status, to 1 of the 2 monitors that failed the federal regulations. Why? Perhaps because this date was the first day of a 3-year long attainment assessment period: 1/1/2011 through 12/31-2013. The monitor selected appeared to perform fine in 2011, but in 2012 it started reading much higher than the original monitor. DEQ took it off-site for over 110 days to get it fixed, but when it came back, it only got worse and in 2013 nearly all of the readings were higher than the original and went as much as 8.1 µg/m3 higher. Pinehurst was designated as being in non-attainment for 2011-2013, simply because DEQ used a machine against the EPA’s advice. (NOTE: DEQ will be quick to point out that they didn’t know in 2011 that the newly revised air quality value would be 12.0 µg/m3. However, this is not true. EPA told the public in March of 2010 in a Policy Assessment that the new number would be between 11 & 13 µg/m3. They also had a couple of years advance notice of the time frame.)

Just as DEQ exercised its power to switch from the original monitor in 2011, it had that same power to return to it at any time. Unfortunately, DEQ failed to exercise this option. In 2014, DEQ did exercise an option: to use the 2nd monitor that had also failed the federal regulation standards. This monitor had since allegedly been improved by the manufacturer, so DEQ decided to test their accuracy for two years at the other monitoring sites in Idaho; but not Pinehurst. It went straight to being used for official attainment assessment with no explanation as to why Pinehurst was being treated differently. This newer monitor failed again statewide, by reading illegally too much BELOW the original. DEQ decided to only use them for informational purposes statewide, beginning in 2015. Once again, Pinehurst got hit with yet another year of non-attainment, but this time because of 35 wildfire smoke days left on the books.

The 2014-2016 assessment period finally put Pinehurst back in attainment with a recorded value of 11.98 µg/m3, which includes over 70 wildfire smoke days in 2014 & 2015 that can legally be removed from the record. If removed, the value would likely be around 10.0. This is below many areas of the nation. DEQ has 3 years, after the fact, to get EPA’s approval to remove them; however, currently DEQ does not have the “resources” to complete this process for at least the 2014 days. Their resources are being diverted to prepare a Crop Residue Burning Plan for the state. DEQ Administrator John Tippets has stated that a “lack of resources” is no excuse for failing to perform its obligations.

What DEQ did not tell the Shoshone News Press was that according to the Clean Air Act, when DEQ submits a Request for Re-designation to Attainment, it also comes with at least one DEQ-monitored 10-year Maintenance Plan that demonstrates how the area will remain in attainment. Unfortunately, the stigma and perception of poor air quality will remain with us for many years because DEQ decided to switch from the original “gold standard” monitor to one they knew would read too high & increase Pinehurst’s chances of going into non-attainment. DEQ will say the decision was based on costs to the State.

Pinehurst has also been in PM 10 non-attainment since 1987, by operation of law. (PM 10 is an air particle slightly larger than a PM 2.5) When doing my research, I learned that the last time Pinehurst violated the standard was in 1991 (25 years ago). I also encountered a Clean Data Determination (CDD) published in 2001 by the EPA stating that Pinehurst had met the standards in 1994, but noted it would remain in non-attainment status until DEQ submitted a Request for Re-designation & 10-year Maintenance Plan. When I asked DEQ for a copy of these documents, there were none.

Their website says they can take “as long as 2 years” to submit these documents, which is what happened to all other areas in Idaho that received their CDDs. Pinehurst is distinguished as waiting the 2nd longest in the nation after getting a CDD. DEQ insisted that they had to get Pinehurst into PM 2.5 non-attainment before they could get us into PM 10 attainment. They now state they anticipate the PM 10 submissions next month.

It is true that Pinehurst has winter thermal inversions and those times do result in degraded air quality, at night. When the monitor’s filters were analyzed in a lab, hourly values were extracted. The values spiked during the middle of the night while most slept. Once the sun rose, the values were back to normal, but the 24-hr average was too high. Also consider: how long are you outside during the winter?

If you have the opportunity to take advantage of DEQ’s grant offerings of free wood stoves, fireplace inserts, weatherization, wood sheds and other things, please do. It will only make our air quality even better AND save you money!

Jann Higdem

Pinehurst