We don’t want to mince words: The Mon Valley stinks today. And the culprit is likely sky-high hydrogen sulfide concentrations at the Allegheny County Health Department’s air quality monitor in Braddock.
In fact, concentrations of H2S were so high Tuesday that by 8 a.m. it was mathematically impossible for them *not* to exceed Pennsylvania’s air quality standard at the Braddock monitor.
It marks the 13th such exceedance at the Braddock air quality monitor so far this year.
But those aren’t the only H2S exceedances of concern locally: There have also been 37 days so far in 2021 at the nearby air quality monitor in Liberty Borough where hydrogen sulfide levels exceeded the state standard.
For the uninitiated: Hydrogen sulfide is a colorless gas recognizable by its distinct rotten-egg odor – a stench local residents know all too well.
GASP has said it before, and we’ll say it again now: Residents deserve an update from the Allegheny County Health Department addressing these ongoing exceedances, what’s causing them, and what is being done to address them.
“The hydrogen sulfide issue harms residents’ quality of life – we hear from people all the time lamenting about having to avoid outdoor exercise or close their windows on otherwise beautiful days,” GASP Executive Director Patrick Campbell said. “And that’s not how people should have to live, especially in a place that has been touted as one of America’s most livable cities.”