Trump touts U.S. air quality -- under Obama
Source: Politico
President Donald Trump on Monday tweeted that the U.S. has the best air quality in the world “BY FAR!” — but the map he shared on Twitter showed the air quality from 2016, the final year of Barack Obama's presidency.
And while the U.S. has lower levels of the single pollutant depicted on the map than most other parts of the world, the underlying United Nations data shows the U.S. actually isn't in the top five nations with the cleanest air.
The cleanest would be Finland, which boasted in a July that its measurement of the pollutant called fine particular matter was the lowest on the planet at 6 micrograms per cubic meter of air, putting it slightly ahead of Estonia, Sweden, Canada, Norway, and Iceland.
The pollutant, also called “PM2.5,” consists of various particles smaller than 2.5 micrometers, significantly tinier than the width of a human hair. It's emitted by cars, power plants, construction sites and other industrial activities, as well as barbecues, tobacco smoking and some natural sources like volcanoes and forest fires. PM pollution has been linked to increases in premature death, heart attacks, aggravated asthma and other respiratory illnesses. It also causes haze, contributes to acid rain and destroys nutrients in soil.
Read more: https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/22/trump-obama-air-quality-873835
