Breathe Easy with the Clean Air Connection

Take Action: Individual Actions

Ground-level ozone pollution is a problem in our area. You can be part of the solution.

Most newer cars only need 30 seconds of idling to warm up in the morning, even in winter. Longer than that is a waste of fuel and causes unneeded wear and tear on your engine. The best way to warm up your car is to drive it at moderate speeds.

Why take action now? The U.S. Environmental Protect Agency has identified the Eastern Panhandle region of West Virginia (Berkeley and Jefferson Counties) as a potential "non-attainment" area for emissions that often act as precursors to the formation of ground-level ozone. In response, the governments of Berkeley and Jefferson Counties and the City of Martinsburg, along with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, entered into a voluntary agreement with EPA to reduce ground-level ozone pollution and improve local air quality in a proactive manner.

You can be part of this proactive effort to improve the air we breathe in the Eastern Panhandle simply by modifying certain individual behaviors, especially on Air Quality Action Days. Individual behavior really does help reduce air pollution - even seemingly small individual acts rapidly add up to improve the air we breathe. So, do your share to clean the air and breathe easy knowing your actions make a difference.

Would you like to receive email notification when an air quality alert has been forecasted for the region? Click on the link below to register online or to download a PDF form to mail in.

Download PDF Version

Thank you for your support to the program, now it's time to get started!

How much do you already know about how your actions can improve air quality? Take our online Air Quality Improvement Quiz, created by the federally collaborative education program, It All Adds Up to Cleaner Air. Then click on the links to the left to learn even more tips for reducing ground-level ozone pollution - on Air Quality Action Days and every day!