Cranbrook residents have real-time air quality data available for their community, thanks to a newly installed monitoring system.

The new station monitors ozone, nitrogen oxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter, as well as wind speed and direction. This data will be used to calculate the Air Quality Health Index (AQHI) for the community.

The station has been made possible through a land-use partnership between the school district (which owns the property) and the provincial government. It is located at the old Muriel Baxter school location, just south of the dog park, and at the corner of 20th Avenue South and 3rd Street South.

Cranbrook’s previous air quality monitoring site was a filter-based system. It collected particulate samples that would be sent to a laboratory for analysis, creating lag times of up to two weeks. 

Quick Facts:

• This year, the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy, and Interior Health are monitoring and forecasting air quality levels in this region and have repeatedly issued smoky skies bulletins related to the forest fire smoke. 
• Smoky skies bulletins are based on:
  • an assessment of current conditions in the geographic area;
  • air monitoring data from the nearest stations, in this case, the Nelson/Castlegar area; and
  • reviewing information from Blue Sky, a smoke forecasting tool in which the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy plays a key role in maintaining.

Learn More:

To access the data from the station, please visit: http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/epd/bcairquality/readings/find-stations-map.html

Results from Blue Sky are used to build publicly available smoke forecasts, which are displayed online: http://www.firesmoke.ca