By John L. Micek | Editor, Pennsylvania Capital-Star It’s Earth Day 2021 in America and in Pennsylvania. So what better time to step back and take stock of the health of one of our most important natural resources: the very air that we breathe. A new report by the American Lung Association gave letter grades to nearly all of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties. And for its two largest, it’s off to clean air summer school: Philadelphia and Allegheny County each got an ‘F’ from the Lung Association for high ozone days. But before suburbanites in Philadelphia’s four collar counties start getting too smug, you have some remedial work ahead of you as well. Bucks and Montgomery counties each got an ‘F’ from the Lung Association, while Chester and Delaware counties received a ‘D’ grade in the report for the same metric.  Counties also were graded for particle pollution. The report includes data from 2017, 2018 and 2019, which is “the most recent quality-assured nationwide air pollution data publicly available,” the document reads. “The American Lung Association’s 2021 ‘State of the Air’ report shows that despite some nationwide progress on cleaning up air pollution, more than 40 percent of Americans live with unhealthy ozone or particle pollution,” the Lung Association’s director of environmental health, Kevin Stewart, said in a statement. “People of color are significantly more likely to breathe polluted air than white people. As the nation works to address climate change and continue reducing air pollution, we must prioritize the health of disproportionately burdened communities.” Below, a look at how Pennsylvania’s most populous counties finished across the two grading areas.

Grade, by county, high ozone days: Berks County: D Blair County: A Centre County: A Cumberland County: DNC (no monitor collecting such data) Dauphin County: B Erie County: B Lackawanna County: A Lancaster County: C Lebanon County: B Lehigh County: C Luzerne County: B Northampton County: D Grade, by county, particle pollution: Allegheny County: F Berks County: D Blair County: B Bucks County: DNC (no monitor collecting such data) Centre County: B Chester County: B Cumberland County: C Dauphin County: C Delaware County: C Erie County: A Lackawanna County: A Lancaster County: F Lebanon County: C Lehigh County: C Luzerne County: DNC (no monitor collecting such data) Montgomery County: A Northampton County: B Philadelphia: A You can read the full grading list for all 67 counties here. Don’t miss environmental news stories like this Click for Blog updates