The Color of Climate
Minority Students Are Getting Choked Out by Air Pollution in Utah
Even on relatively clean air days, the air they breathe is disproportionately worse
This is The Color of Climate, a weekly column from OneZero exploring how climate change and other environmental issues uniquely impact the future of communities of color.
Any kid in notoriously smoggy Salt Lake City knows there are good and bad air days. For students of color in the Utah capital, however, it may seem that most are bad ones.
Students of color in Salt Lake County are disproportionately exposed to air pollution, according to research recently published in Environmental Research. The University of Utah researchers behind the study measured air quality throughout the county and found that schools with more students of color experienced the most air pollution, even on days where the air quality was deemed “clean” by the state’s Department of Air Quality. The findings point to a troubling consequence of long-standing segregation of people of color that can be seen in Utah and across the country.
“Like other U.S. cities, Salt Lake has a history of racial and ethnic segregation, which is still reflected in contemporary patterns of settlement,” senior…
