Jeff Fuentes Gleghorn

The Environmental Protection Agency has awarded a $300,000 grant to fund “Buen Aire Para Todos,” or Good Air for All, a program to improve air quality in East Las Vegas. Buen Aire is a collaboration between ImpactNV, Desert Research Institute, the City of Las Vegas, Make the Road Nevada and the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District. The program will place air quality sensors around East Las Vegas to collect data and give live updates on air quality to community members. Some homes will also receive high quality air filters in order to test the effectiveness of the filters.

In July of 2021, the Las Vegas City Council adopted the City of Las Vegas 2050 Master Plan, which makes improving air quality for low-income neighborhoods a top priority. The goal of the Buen Aire Para Todos project is to gather information so that the Las Vegas city government can come up with solutions for air quality concerns. One strategy the city plans to use is building new parks. “There’s not a lot of green space. So there’s a lot of emissions from vehicles and a lot of extra heat as well,” ImpactNV Director Lauren Boitel told The Nevada Independent. According to the 2050 Master Plan, residents of East Las Vegas are more likely to die because of extreme heat. The city plan to address air quality and heat involves tripling the amount of park space in East Las Vegas, from 140 acres to 480 acres of parks. Parks reduce heat by adding trees and other sources of shade, and reducing the amount of concrete and asphalt. 

The Buen Aire Para Todos project will provide data that the city of Las Vegas needs to come up with solutions to air pollution and extreme heat dangers in East Las Vegas. The 2050 Master Plan adopted by the City Council admits that East Las Vegas has one of the highest levels of ozone in the city and that it is hotter than the more modern city developments. With the information from the air quality sensors, the City Council has a chance to make good on the promises they made to East Las Vegas residents when they adopted the Master Plan last year.