Madison, Wis. — Breathing in cold air carries health risks, but it's unlikely to be from pollution, according to University of Wisconsin Space Science and Engineering Center Director Brad Pierce.Â
"Cold air certainly affects breathing, but not necessarily from an air quality perspective," Pierce said in an interview with Channel 3000. "It has more to do with brining in very cold air into your lungs and damaging those tissues."Â
He said while cold air can lead to issues with air quality, that isn't necessarily the case in the local area. Cold temperatures are not typically associated with high pollution in Madison. The biggest concern is the temperature; the same way your skin has a risk of frostbite.Â
Pierce said locations such as the Uinta Basin in Utah do see increased risk from pollution during extreme cold.Â
"You can get very strong inversions that are associated with those cold temperatures," he said. "And that results in kind of stagnant air trapping all those emissions near the surface."Â
While Madison does have strong inversions, it doesn't have the emission sources associated with oil and gas extraction. There are some local actions that do increase the likelihood of pollution causing problems in the cold air.Â
"We could be trapping emission from cars for example," Pierce said. "These outdoor wood burning stoves, those tend to produce a lot of aerosol pollution. And when we have inversions, you can see rural valleys around southern Wisconsin that have a lot of smoke in them."
That pollution can get trapped in boundary layers that are associated with the cold temperatures.Â
"That's a real big problem in places like Fairbanks, Alaska where they have lots of aerosol pollution in the cold winter because they trap a lot of wood burning stove emissions," Pierce said.Â
Wisconsin actually sees more pollution from foggy springtime days, Pierce said. A combination of pollution from agriculture, ammonia from the manure and nitrogen from cars mix to cause issues when moist air comes in from the south.Â
So while your lungs may hurt on a cold day in Madison, it's probably not because of pollution.Â
"Breathing in extremely cold air is definitely something that can have adverse health effects, but it's not because of air quality," Pierce said. "It's because of the actual temperature of the air."Â
He recommends wearing a facemask if doing a lot of running or exercising in cold weather to heat up some of the air before you breathe it in.Â
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