Travis County received an F for its ozone pollution and levels of fine particulate matter, also called soot, in the air, according to a recent report from the American Lung Association.
The failing grade is based on data from 2021 through 2023 and comes after what regional air quality specialists called steady progress over in the years before.
"What this year's report finds is that we're starting to see the last decade of progress undone," said Charlie Gagen, Texas advocacy director for the association.
In its one passing grade for the area, the report gave Travis County a B when it came to the number of days that saw extreme "spikes" in particle pollution.
Regions with under 3.2 "high particle days" a year obtain a passing grade, according to the standards of the ALA. The report said Travis County was currently averaging less than one such day a year.
The ALA has released its annual "State of the Air" report for the past 26 years, but this year's was the first since 2019 to give Austin an F for ozone pollution.
The report only analyzes data through 2023 because it takes several months after the end of a calendar year to verify the Environmental Protection Agency data from a nationwide network air monitors. (You can read about the association's methodology here).
A couple different measures of ozone are included in the overall grade. Ground level ozone pollution occurs when chemicals released by combustion engines and other sources meet with high temperatures and are "cooked" in the air. While high ozone days often happen when hot, sunny weather combines with a lack of wind so that pollution stays in place and concentrates to dangerously high levels.
That's why Gagen said the trend towards more dangerous ozone days may have as much to do with increasing heat and other weather conditions as it does with local air pollution.
"The big driver is climate change and heat," he said. "The hotter it gets, the easier it is for ozone to be created."
Local air quality experts agree that high temperatures over the last several years have made it harder to combat ozone pollution. In fact, the region is actually reducing nitrogen oxide emissions, a key component to ozone, said Anton Cox, air quality program manager at the Capital Area Council of Governments.
"Emissions are going down," Cox said, pointing to a recent annual air quality report. "But over the past few years, weather conditions have not been favorable."
Cox said the region's preliminary ozone measurements from 2024 appear to show a "marginal" improvement from 2023.
"[In 2024,] we didn't have a record number of 100 Fahrenheit days in a row like we did in 2023," Cox said. "But we did see a lot of really hot days, not a lot of rain."
Experts said levels of particulate matter pollution can also be weather dependent, with strong winds sometimes blowing dust or wildfire smoke into the region. Though local sources like rock quarries, industry, and construction sites also contribute.
The answer, Gagen said, "is reducing the sources we can control."
Nationally, the ALA says the Trump administration's rollbacks in air quality protections and cuts to the EPA's budget and staffing could lead to worse air quality in the future.
"That's a big concern for us," Gagen said. "What are the impacts of those federal cuts going to be on the everyday air we breathe?"
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