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> One of the downsides of being a red state is less will to address environmental concerns like this.

This is patently false. Some of the most beautiful states in the country are home to "red" policies, and there isn't any evidence to the contrary that being "blue" makes anything better, considering some of the most polluted states in the country are blue.

California, for example, you might think has beautiful parts because of "being blue", but California wasn't always "blue", and it wasn't until the 90s where it started consistently going blue...which means the majority of it's natural beauty was designed and led under "red" leadership. Same for Colorado.

There is plenty of "red" environmental think tanks these days. Mostly everyone agrees the environment is worth protecting, just disagree the ways of going about it. Check out the American Conservative Coalition, for example, which argues for a more reasoned approach to tackling climate change, one that many here would find agreeable, such as including natural gas as a transitional energy source off oil and coal, and utilizing nuclear power. https://www.acc.eco/

I think they were addressing general mistrust of climate science and stubbornness to act against human driven climate change or even recognize its existence let alone prioritize environmental concerns like mine tialings and other pollution. In red states, run by conservatives who consider climate science a conspiracy and environmental regulations antithetical to business, this philosophy common. Many of these states (and blue ones too) have low population, no major urban sprawls or cities, and minimal pollution sources near people like chemical plants, refineries, and mines.

SLC is in a red state that generally follows GOP talking points on these issues and has not acted strongly to protect air quality in the area. Polling in the state suggests people do support climate science though. If the city took action like LA/CA to improve emissions standards, implement better public transit to replace commuter cars, and pressed local companies and industry to limit emissions it could get an early start and a rising taxable population to fund these programs.

Because they are politicians! It's their job to act stubborn and pander to their bases, especially in today's winner-take-all environment. They don't actually say what they mean or believe. They only say things that test well with their base and keeps them in power and re-elected. They focus-group most every position they even think about holding, and for the most part stick to blue-meat/red-meat issues.

The sad reality is, if you are a republican with deep convictions that anthropomorphic climate change is the top existential threat in our world, you cannot talk about this publicly (Just like if you are a Democrat with deep convictions about the sanctity of life, you better keep that shit to yourself). Moderates have been booted out of each party.

What they say, and what they do are usually (99.9% of the time) two entirely distinct realities.

> California, for example, you might think has beautiful parts because of "being blue", but California wasn't always "blue", and it wasn't until the 90s where it started consistently going blue...which means the majority of it's natural beauty was designed and led under "red" leadership.

Not at all true. It's true California used to be a Republican Presidential stronghold that flipped very quickly to the Democrats in the 90s, without much competitive period in between. But it has had Democratic state legislative majorities consistently since the 1950s (with Republicans holding the Assembly speakership less than 5 years and the Senate Presidency Pro Tem less than 2 years since 1957.) Democrats have also dominated most statewide Constitutional offices besides the Governorship since about the 1970s, with the Governor's office not seeing the same kind of of super-long-term one-party domination.

> Not at all true. It's true California used to be a Republican Presidential stronghold that flipped very quickly to the Democrats in the 90s

That's exactly what I said?

Either case, let's not forget, even with how "blue" we think California is, there is still more registered republicans in California than Texas, obviously due to California's sheer size in population. That would mean regardless of specific outcomes, republicans were very much involved at all levels of government.

> One of the downsides of being a red state is less will to address environmental concerns like this.

Practically speaking... what would you expect that they do about it?

As a California native, I've seen just how bad short-sighted environmental regulation can be. And it's not like pollution isn't an issue in Los Angeles or the Central Valley, both of which enjoy a strong geographic advantage compared to SLC.

So, what sort of regulation could the state pass that would mitigate the problem? Given the geographical and economic constraints.

As a California native who grew up in LA, I'm extremely grateful for California Air Resources Board [1], which set standards for air quality that helped LA reduce some pretty terrible historic pollution issues, despite growing significantly over the same period [2]. CARB has also been important to fighting climate change by creating a model for other states and nations to follow.

LA is definitely not geographically advantaged when it comes to pollution, given it is a big basin. I'm not sure who wins the geographically disadvantaged olympics, but SLC and LA are more alike than not in this department.

Utah could adopt CARB's stricter air quality standards for one. They could also shutdown or limit pollution sources, including those from home heating. And they could reduce the growing sprawl by encouraging density and public transportation. I'm not a regulatory expert so I can't give you more specifics than that, but it's not like these things aren't possible.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Air_Resources_Board

[2] https://timeline.com/la-smog-pollution-4ca4bc0cc95d

Salt Lake already looks to have a better AQI than LA[1][2], though, and pretty much every new car sold is 50-state compliant (which includes CARB).

So, Utah has already effectively adopted CARB standards, and the rest of your suggestions fit in the same category -- I don't see them making a difference, or being feasible.

[1] https://www.iqair.com/usa/california/los-angeles [2] https://www.iqair.com/usa/utah/salt-lake-city

(On an unrelated note, I like your site -- mine is less populated, but is also a love letter to a less complicated Web.) :)

Good point about how CARB standards have gone national, didn't realize that shift had occurred. CA isn't standing still though and will be requiring zero emissions trucks [1], which I'm not sure other states will be as ready to follow. Hopefully it'll get fleets to simply switch over.

Ya LA is still struggling mightily, especially inland. SLC metro area is a tenth of LA (1.2mm vs 13mm) and growing faster, so these forces may even out. Geographic destiny is hard to overcome.

(Thanks! I wish we could go back to those simpler times) :)

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/25/climate/zero-emissions-tr...

>Unfortunately, there's also bad pollution. The valley makes SLC prone to pollution and especially inversion layers in the winter and ozone in summer. You'd expect mountain air and you get that sometimes, but other times it's as bad as or worse than major cities elsewhere.

I had no idea about this, wow. What causes it? Just the fact that it's in a valley? I've been to SLC only once to visit some friends, but I guess I didn't really notice (was only driving through).

My family lives north of Salt Lake and it does indeed get pretty bad, especially in the winter. I declined a job a Utah valley last year and the pollution was a major driver in that decision.

I agree with the GP about the air pollution. I also find the Salt Lake reeks in the summer. When I would go with my dad as a kid on his business trips, the smell in the summer was really off-putting. I think it's the same problem Mexico City has. Salt Like City is in a bowl, and there's no coastal winds to blow the pollution away like the bay area has, so the pollution just lingers. I do think it's a really clean city on the ground though and Park City is so close and really amazing for Skiing / Snow Boarding. The national parks in Southern Utah are also top notch.

The smell was likely from the lake rather than pollution. The lake can be famously stinky in the right conditions.

More specifically, it's the smell of brine shrimp decaying on the lakeshore. But it's actually not a common occurrence for the Salt Lake stink to be present in the city itself. OP was just lucky!

Yeah, it's just the geography that causes it. It's enclosed on three sides by the Wasatch, Traverse, and Oquirrh mountains which causes cold air to be trapped there. The Salt Lake metro area isn't much different from other cities of similar size and makeup when it comes to actual emissions. It's just that those emissions stick around sometimes during a couple of weeks in the winter. Because of this, Utah meets all the annual mean PM 2.5 EPA requirements but fails the 24-hour limits (we have occasional very bad days but most days are good).

LA and Beijing have the same inversion problem. I think Denver does as well, but I’ve never experienced one there. Seattle has an anti-inversion (clouds get trapped between mountain ranges on all sides, pushing them up into rain, which keeps the air fairly cleaner than it should be).

Unfortunately "its just geography" is kind of one of the talking points for not really addressing the problem. Although true, concerted reductions in pollution have happened when there was political will to make it happen (mostly through the federal gov. / EPA clean air regulations).

Ogden and Provo are some of the worst offenders for per household air pollution emissions. Like many western cities they have longish commutes (everywhere) in large cars (trucks / suv's) with a high number of cars / household and almost non-functional public transport system. For the Salt Lake Metro area, per capita carbon emissions doubled between 1980 and 2015 because of increasing sprawl. Air regulations here are spotty for personal vehicles and I'm guessing almost non-existent for commercial vehicles. Oh and the state governments solution to this is to push a publicly subsidized "inland port" that will bring increased truck and rail traffic to the valley. The leaders of these tech companies are starting to point out that terrible air pollution for parts of the year is hurting recruitment so it seems like as the money flows into this sector maybe there will be political will on the state and local side to address some of these issues.

It's a big bowl, like Los Angeles and Phoenix. Smog just gets kind of stuck there.

Except the Los Angeles basin is open to the ocean for a good portion of it. And the other side has a valley that leads to the IE, where pollution seeps and sits.

It’s the complete opposite of the two other examples in that list.

It’s the same with Calgary, Alberta as well. Rocky Mountains on one side and the prairie on the other. It still gets inversions and bad pollution.

My understanding is it’s a layer of cold air that sits over warmer air on the ground.

Inversion means warmer air is above cooler air - it's inverted from normal where temperature decreases with altitude and leads to a very stable atmosphere with little convection. So the air on the ground stays there.

As others have stated it’s directly tied to geography. For the same effect in a far more dramatic way look at Kabul.

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/afghanistanair-polluti...

Kabul’s geography resembles an elevated bowl much like Oregon’s Crater Lake. Just like the SLC area Kabul’s air pollution problem is magnified during the winter.

In some ways, mid-winter Kabul reminds me a lot of Blade Runner. It's 9:30 pm, pitch black outside, the air is choking with dust and smog from people burning literally everything possible to stay warm. Visibility is less than a city block. You're rolling through an area with some neon lit wedding halls and suddenly there's a giant lit up billboard with 4G LTE mobile phone advertising on it next to a dozen artificial plastic fuschia/green/blue neon lit palm tree in front of a banquet hall. You drive onwards, your colleague in the passenger seat clutching their rifle between their legs, barrel resting on the floor.

What's wrong with dry air in the winter? Humidity + cold is unbearable. I'd much rather have to put on lotion.

Dry eye gets worse as you age.

Humidifiers?

I live in a dry climate and humidifiers can only help so much

Who said anything about dry air?

Winter in SLC and Utah County brings an inversion layer that traps polluted air from the ground up to about 8000 feet above sea level. That pollution causes all sorts of respiratory issues. Speaking from experience - it’s awful. No lotion in the world fixes it.

It doesn’t help that gas are two levels octane lower than in other places (so standard gas is 85, not 87), Denver does the same thing.

I lived in SLC for a few years and it’s ok. In fact, I know of no other cities with 24 hour coffee shops, which is great when you want to code and write all night. But I have no feeling to return, it’s nice but kind of boring.

> It doesn’t help that gas are two levels octane lower than in other places (so standard gas is 85, not 87), Denver does the same thing.

That’s due to high elevation. There’s no need for higher octane. I’m at the same elevation as Denver and my car requires 93 but the highest I’ll find is 91 which is just fine.