Dust expert praises plan but raises concerns that it will dilute data and follow “scientifically indefensible” protocols.
After fielding concerns over the shrinking Great Salt Lake for years, Utah regulators are getting to work building out an air quality monitoring network to better understand the impacts of dust pollution across the state.
The plan will install a series of new air quality monitors, and beef up existing ones, so the Division of Air Quality can track coarser-grained particulate pollution called PM 10. The network will extend as far north as Logan, as far south as Sevier Dry Lake near Delta, and also track dust blowing from the west desert. Regulators estimate it will cost $1 million, with the Great Salt Lake Commissioner’s Office footing half the bill.
While stakeholders have largely praised the effort, at least one air quality expert wondered why the state’s plan seems to be dodging the federal protocols Utah currently uses to monitor pollutants like PM 2.5 from winter inversions and ozone during the summer.
“As a scientist, I just want to know the answer,” wrote Kevin Perry, a professor of atmospheric sciences, in comments submitted to DAQ and obtained through a records request. “However, as a citizen, I think it would be a travesty to spend $1M on infrastructure that doesn’t meet federal monitoring standards.”
Dust blows from the Great Salt Lake every month of the year, Perry wrote. The public has a right to know, he added, whether the dust is causing health hazards, and the state should be obligated to respond as quickly as possible if that’s the case.
DAQ officials gave presentations of the draft plan to federal agencies and other groups last month. Department of Environmental Quality Executive Director Tim Davis, who oversees DAQ, also discussed details with reporters. Davis formerly worked as a deputy Great Salt Lake commissioner before taking his new role this spring. He said he has made the network a priority and expects to get at least part of it live this year.
“We’re just trying to get the network built as quickly as we can,” Davis said in an interview Tuesday, “to get the information people have been asking for.”
The proposed dust monitoring network for the Great Salt Lake and beyond uses non-regulatory equipment and protocols, however. It would operate filters over 48-hours instead of the standard 24-hour period, a decision Perry said in his comments was “both unprecedented and scientifically indefensible.”
That’s because dust storms typically last between 3 to 18 hours. Including an extra 24 hours in the filter cycle will dilute the collected dust signal, making it difficult to adequately determine both the source of the pollution and impacts to public health.
Perry noted in his comments that when he asked DAQ officials to justify their deviation from protocol, he was told “filters are expensive.”
“First of all, the cost of the filters is very small compared to the analytical costs,” Perry wrote. “Secondly, it seemed to me that the main purpose for deviating from the standard 24-hr sampling protocol was actually to avoid regulatory protocol compliance.”
Utah has long been at odds with the Environmental Protection Agency over federal air quality standards. In 2023, it sued over the “good neighbor rule,”when EPA found the state’s coal-burning power plants were sending pollution downwind to Colorado.
In December, the EPA under former President Joe Biden’s administration moved the Salt Lake area from “moderate” to “serious” nonattainment status for ozone. Utah regulators complained they’ve done everything they can to reign in the pollutant and that it is blowing in from other sources. The new administration under President Donald Trump has signaled it agrees with the state’s position.
Davis, however, denied he felt any pressure from lawmakers or other policymakers to circumvent federal standards.
“We may do iterations of technology,” Davis said, “and do tests to compare different types of monitors.”
Reached by phone, Perry mostly offered praise for the state’s proposal.
“It’s really good and a great improvement over what we currently don’t have,” said Perry, who teaches at the University of Utah. “We’re quibbling over details about how these things are being deployed.”
He remained skeptical, however, over Davis’s claim that the decision to use non-regulatory equipment and protocols was a time-saving measure.
“It doesn’t take any extra time to deploy regulatory equipment,” he said, “versus the equipment they’re opting to deploy.”
Using federal standards may even prove the public health hazards aren’t as bad as some may fear.
“That’s the whole point of monitoring,” Perry said. “We don’t know the answer.”
The professor also provided a few “minor” comments and concerns in his written feedback, including adding a monitoring station in Corrine to track dust blowing from Bear River Bay and a station in St. George. He noted rapid growth in southwest Utah is kicking up dust from construction, along with the fungus that causes Valley Fever.
Others who submitted written comments include the U.S. Geological Survey, which endorsed pairing cameras with monitors, and Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment. The public health advocacy group called on DAQ to track a variety of materials in the lake’s dust, from heavy metals to PFAS, or “forever chemicals.”
While toxic metals like mercury and arsenic have dominated conversations about potential Great Salt Lake pollutants, UPHE’s board president Brian Moench said he has concerns about all the materials discharged by the more than two-dozen wastewater treatment plants and industrial plants that discharge to the lake and its tributaries.
“Just about everything that escapes into the environment at large from sewage treatment plants and industrial waste streams,” Moench said, “includes virtually every chemical that’s a byproduct of modern society.”
A 2022 study found more PFAS in the water discharged from treatment plants than the water entering them. EPA has linked PFAS to cancer, developmental defects and infertility. Moench also has concerns about pharmaceuticals, plastics and dioxins making their way into the lake’s dust
Davis said he’s receptive to all the feedback received.
“If it’s possible to do with the filters and equipment we’re using, we can iterate as we go,” he said. “I’m excited we have a plan. I know people have wanted information for a while, and the better data we can get out to people the better decisions we can all make.”
