Citizens for Clean Air Grand Junction CO nonprofit

We're all volunteers at Citizens for Clean Air! We formed during the winter of 2012-13 due to weeks of terrible air pollution that had settled in our valley. Some of us suffered ill health effects and as we began outreach to the community we discovered many others who suffered from poor air quality as well. So we learned about particulates, ozone and volatile organic compounds (VOC). We studied the sources, then started addressing the them one by one.

We developed such a wonderful team of volunteers doing such great work that we decided to become official, and established nonprofit status in 2018. 

We've made some progress! Together with other community members we spearheaded a successful effort to restrict certain outdoor burning activities by residents within the City of Grand Junction. The restrictions were then adopted, in part,  by the Mesa County Public Health department. 

In order to inform residents of current air quality status, we worked with PurpleAir, Inc. to install over 60 air quality monitors throughout the Grand Valley and beyond; 0we continue to service and repair the units, and our efforts have increased awareness. The system and it's real time internet reporting was especially valuable during the summer of 2020 during the terrible wildfires.

We are now in our third year of researching and experimenting with a charcoal-like material made from biomass called biochar, a product with the potential to decrease the use of agricultural outdoor burning, increase soil water retention and crop yields, and sequester carbon.