Apps for the Environment
Webinar 3 Transcript
7-13-11
Moderator
Hello, everyone, and welcome to the third webinar for EPA’s Apps for the Environment challenge. My
name is Sarah Swenson and I’ll be moderating today. For the next several weeks, these webinars will
focus on the datasets developers can use to design apps for the EPA challenge. Today we’ll be talking
about two of EPA’s air data resources, and our speaker will be John White from EPA’s Office of Air
Quality Planning and Standards.
As a reminder, all of your phone lines are muted. As you listen to today’s speakers, go ahead and type
any questions you may have for them into the GoTo Meeting panel, and we’ll answer them at the end of
the webinar. If you have technical issues with the webinar, please let us know right away.
To begin, I’ll give a little background on Apps for the Environment in case some of you are new to the
challenge. Then we’ll hear from our presenters and take questions at the end. Finally, if you haven’t
already bookmarked it, please check out the main Apps for the Environment page at
www.epa.gov/appsfortheenvironment.
(BACKGROUND SLIDE)
And now, I’ll turn the presentation over to John.
Speaker
John E. White
Hi, everyone. I'm John White, and I'm the program manager for EPA’s AIRNow Program. I'm going to
discuss what is available from the AIRNow system and how you can get the data via AIRNow Gateway,
our main data distribution hub. To begin , I want to walk through a quick powerpoint presentation to
cover the key points about the AIRNow data and Gateway system, then I will end with a quick look at
the actual AIRNow Gateway website, where you can register for an account later if you want to grab
some data.
Looking at slide 2, AIRNow is the nation’s real-time air quality reporting system, mainly using the Air
Quality Index as the tool to inform the public about current and forecasted air quality conditions.
AIRNow started in 1999 and has grown to include all 50 States, all of Canada, and some data from
Mexico. Over 130 state, local, tribal and federal agencies (such as the National Park Service and USFS)
voluntarily send to AIRNow their real-time air quality data (mainly ozone and PM2.5) every hour. There
are also over 80 forecasting programs (state/local) that submit to AIRNow their current and next day air
quality forecasts (e.g., tomorrow is a code red day for Cincinnati). AIRNow is the centralized hub for all
of these data and we develop products (files and maps) to distribute to the media, researchers, private
sector, other federal agencies, and the public via AIRNow Gateway and our public website, airnow.gov.
The airnow.gov website only shows AQI information and maps, no data files are available. Slide 3 shows
the details of the Air Quality Index, again this is how we translate pollutant concentrations into
something more meaningful/easier to understand (at least the colors anyway).
However AIRNow makes air quality data and forecasts available to the interested parties via AIRNow
Gateway, which I will cover briefly today. First, I want to emphasize that AIRNow is a multilayered data
source and we can't cover it all during this webinar. Later, I'll point out several resources you can use to
get more information and establish an account if interested, and I encourage you to use them if you
have questions about AIRNow.
Slide 4 shows a breakdown of the types of data available from AIRNow Gateway and some uses of the
data. Obviously giving developers access to our system to develop applications is the focus of this
webinar. Slide 5 just shows some current example applications that already exist (various web site and
iphone apps)
Slide 6 is a quick overview of where we have been in regard to web services and where we are going,
which is important. We are in a state of transition right now to develop an API for developers.
Slide 7 shows an example of a current RESTFul web service that we offer – getting a forecast by zip code.
We offer various payload format options (CSV, JSON, KML, XML) as well. Slide 8 shows several examples
of the uses of this web service. Slide 9 shows an example of someone using our Web Coverage Service
(WCS)
Now Slide 10 shows a listing of all available web services that Gateway offers. Slide 11 provides some
information on our API project which is currently underway. We expect to have this implemented in 8
months. The last slide has some contact information for your reference and for future questions.
Now allow me to briefly show you the Gateway website. The URL is www.airnowgateway.org . To
request a new account, click Login at the top left, and underneath the username/password is a link to
Request a New Account. We do ask for a signed Data Use Agreement, which is available as a PDF link on
the home page. The main emphasis is to caveat the data, this is meant for real-time AQI reporting only
– not official certified final data….and to give credit to our partner agencies.
AIRNow Gateway has two main pieces – text files and web services. You can find a PDF describing what
is in each file/format. Basically we currently offer current observed air quality data, forecasts, action
days, monitor and agency site information. As I mentioned before we are in a transition phase and we
will be expanding this in our API project.
Thank you and feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
Questions and Answers
No questions from attendees.