Hillsides cradle the towns along the Ohio River in the Northern Panhandle and smokestacks from steel mills and power plants rise up along the river as it winds through the valley.
It’s those industries and the valley topography that contribute to this region’s air quality problems.
A USA today article last year ranked air quality outside schools across the nation using data from the Environmental Protection Agency.
According to the article, only 12 other schools in the country have more toxic air than Follansbee Middle School in Brooke County, north of Wheeling.
“I honestly believe it was not a shock to anybody that lives here in the county,” said Mary Kay DeGarmo, Brooke County Schools Superintendent.
“For years we’ve dealt with air quality issues. I do believe that the industries in the area have taken this very seriously, and that they are doing everything in their power to help us have cleaner air,” she said.
The newspaper article spurred the federal Environmental Protection Agency to monitor the air at more than 60 schools across the country; four are in West Virginia and Follansbee Middle School is on the list.
“I do think with our air filtering system and hopefully new windows and doors before long, I think that will all help with the safety of our students,” DeGarmo said.
Long-time Wheeling resident Mary Ellen Cassidy wasn’t surprised to hear the news about air quality problems around her hometown. She doesn’t like her town receiving bad press, but she’s also glad to see the issue raised.
“If you look at the map on the EPA Web site of the list of schools, you’ll notice a little cluster in our area,” Cassidy said.
“I think that speaks volumes about the industry and the companies in this area and are we ready now to consider that maybe we need to diversify our economy,” she said.
With an economy traditionally based in steel and coal, Cassidy says jobs at these industries have always been held in high regard.
“We don’t talk about it a lot because there’s kind of an understood code of silence, ‘don’t complain about the industry too much in the area, because their response may be, if you don’t like how we’re doing business, we’ll pick up and leave,” said Cassidy.
The EPA will monitor the air outside Follansbee Middle School for ten random days over the next several months. Then it will determine if more monitoring is needed or if action to reduce the pollution is necessary.
But the Northern Panhandle is just one example of air pollution in West Virginia. Other areas that consistently violate clean air standards are Charleston and Kanawha and Putnam Counties.
The state’s pollution problems don’t just reside in the larger cities or more industrial areas either.
Monongalia County also made the EPA’s list of regions where pollution levels were too high between 2005 and 2007.
These high pollution levels are related to emissions from coal fired power plants. Monongalia County is home to several of these plants, a few more are in nearby counties, and a new plant is under construction north of Morgantown.
Nearby, doctors at West Virginia University are studying what air pollution does to our bodies. Alan Ducatman is chair of West Virginia University’s Department of Community Medicine.
“On a population sense we can be fairly sure that bad things are happening,” said Ducatman. “There are lots of well designed studies that show that increases in all of the different types of air pollution result in increases in either upper respiratory or heart disease depending on what you are looking at.”
WVU researcher Tim Nurkiewicz is studying how ultra fine particles from diesel exhaust affects our health.
“When we see exhaust coming from a diesel engine you’re looking at the coarse, larger particles the black soot that you can see; the ultra fines you cannot see,” said Nurkiewicz.
“In terms of our health there are two issues at hand: one is the inherent toxicity of particles that we breathe in and the other is where the particles can go.”
These tiny particles travel into our lungs and can enter the bloodstream, and this affects blood flow to various parts of the body.
“It’s not just the heart that is affected by particle exposure, there is also an increased incident of stroke on air pollution days,” Nurkiewicz said. “There are also renal disease problems, and there are increased incidents of high blood pressure on days when particle pollution is elevated.”
Ultra fine particles are not currently monitored in West Virginia. However, the state Department of Environmental Protection measures ozone and larger particulate matter in several areas.
Ground level ozone forms mostly from volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides. There are eight ozone monitors in the state.
Fine particulate pollution is too small for the eye to see but most of this pollution comes from sulfur dioxides and nitrogen oxides. There are 14 fine particulate monitors in the state.
Emissions from vehicles, coal fired power plants and other industries are the main sources of ozone and particulate pollution.
Ducatman says the air is cleaner than it was 25 years ago but more needs to be done.
“Taking responsibility for our own behavior is part of the answer. It’s not like we’re talking about villains we’re talking about us,” he said. “You know everyone of us want the electricity to come on when we flip the switch we just have to think about how often we do it and can we do better.”