Season's first no-burn restrictions set as cold invites inversion


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SALT LAKE CITY — The state's first mandatory no-burn restrictions came Tuesday with the season's first temperature inversion, with bans on wood burning in effect for Davis, Salt Lake and Cache counties.

Residents are also being asked to refrain from driving, if possible, and take mass transit or carpool to curb harmful emissions. As the inversion wears on into Wednesday, air quality experts expect levels to build.

Bo Call, manager of the air monitoring section within the Utah Department of Environmental Quality, said cold temperatures plus snow cover and a stagnant weather pattern are combining to fuel a spike in PM2.5, or fine particulate pollution.

Although levels of PM2.5 were relatively low Tuesday afternoon — still in the "good zone" of the air quality index — the agency wants motorists and residents to be more proactive when it comes to activities that contribute to poor air quality.

Call said the decreasing air quality conditions actually waited to arrive this season later than what is typical.

In 2014, for example, both Davis and Salt Lake counties had mandatory restrictions kick in before Thanksgiving and days when voluntary advisories were instituted, he said.

"Actually, we have gone through the entire month of November without much of anything, which is not as normal as you think," Call said.

Season's first no-burn restrictions set as cold invites inversion

The sudden jolt of cold — it was 2 degrees in Logan on Tuesday morning and lows in Salt Lake City have hit the teens — may make the temperature inversion feel even more unbearable.

The good news in all of this is the inversion is expected to be short-lived.

National Weather Service meteorologist Monica Traphagan said southerly winds will kick up Thursday in advance of a storm system that will arrive Friday and last into Saturday.

While the storm is not expected to deliver much, if anything, to valley floors, the shift in the weather pattern will scrub out the pollution.

Traphagan said it will also be warmer, with highs in the upper 40s Thursday. With the arrival of the storm, temperatures will drop to the low 40s.

Residents can check pollution levels at the state's website, www.air.utah.gov, and also download the mobile app, Utah Air, which allows users to see air quality information in real time wherever they are.

Contributing: Geoff Liesik

An inversion settles over the Salt Lake Valley as viewed from Grandeur Peak on Nov 30, 2015. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)
An inversion settles over the Salt Lake Valley as viewed from Grandeur Peak on Nov 30, 2015. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)

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