‘State of the Air’ Report Finds that Des Moines Must Continue to Focus on Cleaning Up the Air for Residents

Today, the American Lung Association released its 27th annual “State of the Air” report, which finds that nearly half of the children in the U.S. are breathing unhealthy levels of air pollution, including 112,282 kids in Iowa. The metro area was named the 80th most polluted in the nation for ozone pollution and received a D grade. 

The Lung Association’s “State of the Air” report grades counties’ air quality in terms of unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone air pollution (also known as smog), and year-round and short-term spikes in particle pollution (also known as soot) over a three-year period (2022-2024). The report also ranks counties and metropolitan areas in cleanest and most polluted lists for each pollutant. Both ozone and particle pollution can cause premature death and other serious health effects such as asthma attacks, heart attacks and strokes, preterm births and impaired cognitive functioning later in life. Particle pollution can also cause lung cancer.

Infants, children and teens as a group are more susceptible to the health impacts of air pollution. Their lungs are still developing, they breathe more air for their body size than adults and they are frequently exposed to outdoor air. Air pollution exposure in childhood can cause long-term harm, including reduced lung growth, new asthma cases and increased risk of respiratory diseases.

“Clean air is essential to the health and wellbeing of families across Iowa. Children deserve to breathe air that won’t make them sick,” said Kristina Hamilton, director of advocacy for the American Lung Association. “Unfortunately, too many people in the Des Moines metro area are living with unhealthy levels of ozone pollution. This air pollution is causing kids to have asthma attacks, contributing to chronic health conditions, and making people who work outdoors sick.” 

Hamilton added: “To compound the issue further, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) rollbacks of critical healthy air rules are impacting our residents. We urge decision-makers in Iowa to take action to improve our air quality, we are calling on everyone to tell EPA that our kids’ health counts.”

Nationally, the report found that 33.5 million children in the U.S., or 46% of people under 18 years old, live in an area that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution. In total, 44% of people of all ages in the U.S. (152 million people in total) live in a county that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution. 32.9 million people live in counties with failing grades for all three measures.

Key Findings for Des Moines-West Des Moines-Ames, IA metro area:
Ground-level Ozone Pollution: 
Ozone “smog” affects the largest number of people in the U.S. Smog forms when gases from tailpipes, smokestacks, factories and other pollution sources react with sunlight. It is a powerful respiratory irritant with effects that have been likened to a sunburn of the lungs.  

• The Des Moines-West Des Moines-Ames, IA metro area ranked 80th worst in the nation for ozone pollution.
  • The ranking was based on the area’s worst county’s average number of unhealthy days—3 days per year, a D grade, in Polk County, Iowa.
  •  This was better than the area's ranking in last year's report of 75th worst, with 3 days per year, a D grade.  

Particle Pollution: 
Fine particle pollution can be extremely dangerous and even deadly. These particles come from wildfires, wood-burning stoves, coal-fired power plants, diesel engines and other sources. The report has two grades for particle pollution: one for “short-term” particle pollution, or daily spikes, and one for the annual average “year-round” level that represents the concentration of particles in each location.

• The Des Moines-West Des Moines-Ames, IA metro area ranked 76th worst in the nation for short-term particle pollution.
  • The ranking was based on the area’s worst county’s average number of unhealthy days—2.5 days per year, a D grade, in Polk County, Iowa.
  • This was better than the area's ranking in last year's report of 73rd worst, with 2.8 days per year, a D grade. 
• For the year-round average level of particle pollution, the area’s worst county, Polk County, Iowa, received a passing grade for pollution levels below the federal standard. 
  • The Des Moines-West Des Moines-Ames, IA metro area ranked 120th worst in the nation.
  • This was better than the area's ranking in last year's report of 110th worst in the nation. 

The Lung Association is calling on everyone to urge EPA to value the health of America’s kids. Historically, EPA has played an essential role in protecting people’s health from air pollution. The current EPA has retreated from its public health foundation by rolling back clean air protections. This EPA has also taken the recent step of eliminating health-related information from its economic analyses, meaning that the costs of pollution to kids, families and communities will not be counted as policies are undone. EPA must not devalue kids’ health.

See the full report results and take action at Lung.org/sota.