The Air / Central Valley

Air quality in Bakersfield right now

91ModerateUS AQI · updated 10:41 PM PT

BAKERSFIELD — The air over Bakersfield reads 91 on the federal index tonight — moderate.

The pollutants, against the WHO guideline

Pollutant	Now	WHO 24h	× guideline
PM2.5 µg/m³	23.1	15	1.5×
PM10 µg/m³	85.7	45	1.9×
Ozone µg/m³	79	100	0.8×
NO₂ µg/m³	14.3	25	0.6×
SO₂ µg/m³	0.8	40	0.0×
CO mg/m³	0.1	4	0.0×

Source: Open-Meteo (Copernicus CAMS) · WHO 2021 global air quality guidelines · No figure on this page is written by hand.

What this air means

For most people this air changes nothing. The most sensitive — people with asthma, COPD, or heart disease — may notice it on long, hard exertion outdoors; everyone else can carry on.

The mechanism, briefly

Particles under 2.5 microns — a fortieth the width of a hair — ride air all the way to the alveoli, the one-cell-thick membrane where the lung hands oxygen to the blood. The membrane cannot tell oxygen’s friends from its enemies: within an hour of significant exposure, ultrafine particulate is circulating. That is why the numbers on this page are worth checking — dose is the only variable you control.

From the Air desk

Our carbon is turning the ocean acidic — and dissolving the shells of the snails the food web runs onRiver Mast PM2.5 doesn't just irritate your lungs — new pathology shows it permanently rebuilds the tissueIris Vale Governments smooth the spikes out of air-quality data before you see it — here's the math that hides the worst hoursSol Index A lid of warm air is trapping the heat domes over the Northern Hemisphere — and it won't moveCael Frost

Nearby

Visalia · Lancaster · Ventura · Santa Barbara · Oxnard · Glendale

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