Ways to help keep the air a little cleaner on a toxic air day.

Toxic air days are serious health concerns for the elderly, pregnant, infants and children, smokers, those with cardiovascular disease, those with asthma or a chronic respiratory disease.

A toxic smoke day isn’t just about today. it’s about the conditions that make todays more frequent.

“When the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its landmark 2018 climate report, it seemed that people were suddenly listening. Eco-anxiety is high and for good reason. The report found that the planet is warming more quickly than previously thought, and estimates that by 2040, the world will be in crisis, experiencing extremes of drought and flood. With extreme weather and its impacts devastating homes and farms across the country, and the UN’s sobering preview of a future only getting worse, we are all itching to do our part.”

1. Don’t run leaf blowers, scooters, lawn mowers, cars during the day as possible.

2. Use a portable air cleaner to reduce indoor air pollution. Make sure it is sized for the room and that it does not make ozone, which is a harmful air pollutant. Don’t have one? You can reduce smoke exposure by keeping the windows closed and using the air conditioner on the recirculate setting. Wear an N95 mask outdoors if you have to be outdoors.

4. Don’t idle your car

5. Bike/walk/bus more often, just not much today

6. Drive an EV instead of a fossil fuel burner.

7. Fly less.

8. Go vegan: your carbon forkprint makes up an awful lot of your carbon footprint. “The worldwide phase out of animal agriculture, combined with a global switch to a plant-based diet, would effectively halt the increase of atmospheric greenhouse gases for 30 years and give humanity more time to end its reliance on fossil fuels, according to a new study by scientists from Stanford University…”

9. Boycott plastic; it’s literal climate crisis in form and will never go away

10. Vote for those who take climate crisis seriously on a local, state, and national level.

What else?

Yes, small actions matter, when millions of people all do them they become movements.

Power doesn’t change for the fun of it or to do the right thing. It changes because it has to. Don’t give up your power. We’ve seen that in every movement, from Civil Rights to democracy itself–it starts at the bottom. Don’t give up your power.

We drive demand. That’s capitalism.