Grant: Alliance Grants

In British Columbia, summertime wildfire smoke is an increasingly important source of air pollutant exposure. Furthermore, in many communities in British Columbia, particularly those outside of Metro Vancouver (e.g., Squamish, Whistler, Pemberton), wood burning fireplaces are used for home heating during winter. As such, the impacts of wood smoke on these communities are two-fold with enhancements in pollutant concentrations in both summer and winter. To address poor air quality from wood smoke, communities are increasingly exploring options to reduce community-level exposures by both communicating individual steps to improve household air quality and by creating community cleaner air spaces (CCASs) in locations like libraries and community centres. The characteristics of CCASs can vary widely. Some facilities have enhanced air filtration using MERV13 (or higher) filters, while others have only standard HVAC systems where indoor air pollutant concentrations are reduced via controlled air exchange rates, closing windows / enabling recirculation modes with air conditioning, and through low-grade filter systems found in HVAC systems (MERV 1 or 2 rating). Additionally, many of these facilities are only operated and advertised as CCASs for a few days a year, so very little is known about their performance during non-wildfire smoke episodes. Furthermore, past research has mostly focused on assessing particulate matter impacts, and measurement of both gas and particle-phase pollutants has been identified as an important research gap. The primary goal of this partnership is therefore to better understand the impact of different CCAS characteristics (including assessing multiple pollutants and effectiveness during wildfire and non-wildfire episodes) to support ongoing improvements to community air protection, along with communicating important wildfire smoke protection messaging via a text-messaged-based community engagement platform linked to an air quality monitoring network.