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Page 20│Kittitas County Air Quality Survey│9/30/2014 Discussion This survey set out to determine the community attitudes surrounding poor air quality in Kittitas County and to inventory the burning practfces that contribute to PM2.5 air pollutfon. The results show that the community is divided on whether or not poor air quality is a significant environmental issue here in Kittitas County. However, survey results indicate that most residents are not clear on what PM2.5 pollutfon is, how they can monitor it for themselves , or which of their behaviors contribute to it. A large portfon of the community appears to feel strongly that there should be incentfves and educatfonal materials available to encourage cleaner burning practfces. These findings indicate that there is an emergent need for outreach and educatfon regarding the current status of air quality in Kittitas County as well as the impact burning practfces can have on PM2.5 air pollutfon. Our findings regarding wood burning emissions are similar to other studies conducted in the region with some notable exceptfons. In 2007, The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency (PSCAA) conducted a wood burning emissions inventory survey of King, Kitsap, Pierce and Snohomish countfes.7 Ecology compared the Kitsap, Pierce, and Snohomish county survey data from this report with the Kittitas County survey results. The data shows Kittitas County households burning solid fuel as a primary heat source 22% more than Kitsap, Pierce, and Snohomish county residents. A statewide wood burning survey conducted in 2010 by the Northwest Air Quality Communicators (NAQC) reported that 25% of Washington state households have a wood burning appliance (fireplace, insert, wood or pellet stove).8 Our survey results show approximately 40% of Kittitas County households are burning solid fuel in a wood burning appliance, which is higher than the statewide average. In terms of attitudes of frequent wood burners, the NAQC study found that “frequent wood burners see the situatfon differently from air quality professionals. The large majority did not perceive an air quality problem at all and they did not connect their wood burning to air quality or health threats”. It would appear that the attitudes of Kittitas County residents follow this statewide trend as well. While our findings provide an overview of wood burning appliance use, it would be helpful to do a more specific inventory to verify our high numbers of indoor solid fuel burning. We would also need to look more closely at fuel usage and get specific amounts for a more comprehensive emissions inventory that can be compared with additfonal regional studies. It would also be helpful to gather more informatfon about motfvatfon for compliance behaviors specifically related to clean burning practfces in additfon to seasoning wood and legal outdoor burning. Further exploratfon should be done to determine if those reportfng certffied equipment really understand what being “certffied” means and if those who reported not knowing can clarify their answers. The survey process encountered some limitatfons that should be addressed to improve future data gathering. Our survey was translated into Spanish but due to a limited distributfon tfmeline, we were not able to get the desired percentage of responses from the Hispanic community. Responses from the male sector of our community were also incongruent with populatfon demographics. Female responses outnumbered male three to one. This higher rate of response from females is consistent