{"id":244226,"date":"2026-07-15T19:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T19:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/244226\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T19:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T19:32:11","slug":"pa-department-of-environmental-quality-issues-statewide-air-quality-alert-for-thursday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/244226\/","title":{"rendered":"PA Department of Environmental Quality Issues Statewide Air Quality Alert For Thursday"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tFrom the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection: The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (Department or DEP) is issuing a STATEWIDE CODE RED Air Quality Alert (AQA) for Thursday for fine particulate matter (PM2.5). Wildfire smoke from Ontario, Canada and Minnesota will be entering the Commonwealth from the northernmost counties first, then later to the south, this Wednesday afternoon and lingering through Friday. Additionally, a STATEWIDE CODE ORANGE AQA for PM2.5 is forecasted for Friday. Please note that the PM2.5 health-based standard is based on a 24\u2011hour average, where individual hours will have concentrations higher (and lower) than the forecast. DEP forecasts PM2.5 using this 24\u2011hour framework to help the public understand when overall daily air quality may reach unhealthy levels to sensitive groups (USG \u2013 Code Orange) or unhealthy for all (Code Red) and to guide actions that reduce exposure. DEP will continue to monitor the smoke conditions.Check live conditions around the Valley\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tHARRISBURG, Pa. \u2014 \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>From the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection: <\/p>\n<p>The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (Department or DEP) is issuing a STATEWIDE CODE RED Air Quality Alert (AQA) for Thursday for fine particulate matter (PM2.5). <\/p>\n<p>\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\" aspect-ratio-original lazyload lazyload-in-view\" alt=\"wildfire smoke impacting air quality\" title=\"Air Quality Alert For Thursday \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/719f735f-6dca-4dd8-8a20-d6450e910446.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\tHearst OwnedFrom WGAL\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCode Red Air Quality For Thursday\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Wildfire smoke from Ontario, Canada and Minnesota will be entering the Commonwealth from the northernmost counties first, then later to the south, this Wednesday afternoon and lingering through Friday. <\/p>\n<p>\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\" aspect-ratio-original lazyload lazyload-in-view\" alt=\"wildfire smoke impacting air quality\" title=\"Code Red Explainer \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/ea90217e-8d09-4d9f-98e4-981912f13510.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\" aspect-ratio-original lazyload lazyload-in-view\" alt=\"wildfire smoke impacting air quality\" title=\"Smoke Plume Forecast For Thursday \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1345e186-617b-4e33-9fe8-0635c38c90f6.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Additionally, a STATEWIDE CODE ORANGE AQA for PM2.5 is forecasted for Friday. Please note that the PM2.5 health-based standard is based on a 24\u2011hour average, where individual hours will have concentrations higher (and lower) than the forecast. <\/p>\n<p>\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\" aspect-ratio-original lazyload lazyload-in-view\" alt=\"wildfire smoke impacting air quality\" title=\"Air Quality Four Day Forecast \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/86319387-b112-479e-b4a9-b4c5ea80c9a9.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>DEP forecasts PM2.5 using this 24\u2011hour framework to help the public understand when overall daily air quality may reach unhealthy levels to sensitive groups (USG \u2013 Code Orange) or unhealthy for all (Code Red) and to guide actions that reduce exposure.<\/p>\n<p> DEP will continue to monitor the smoke conditions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection: The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (Department or DEP) is issuing&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244227,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2805,30257,6589,99223,3701,2806,1788,2807,37,11955,507,2002,2808,6590,2810,28,30,29,6591,6664,3689,2811,2483,1133,2812,55197,2813],"class_list":["post-244226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-adams","tag-air-quality","tag-carlisle","tag-code-red","tag-cumberland","tag-dauphin","tag-forecast","tag-franklin","tag-harrisburg","tag-impact-day","tag-juniata","tag-lancaster","tag-lebanon","tag-mifflin","tag-news-8","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-perry","tag-smoke","tag-south-central-pennsylvania","tag-storm-team","tag-susquehanna-valley","tag-weather","tag-wgal","tag-wildfires","tag-york"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244226\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}