After years of air pollution releases at the Suncor oil and gas refinery in Commerce City, Colo., Olga Gonzalez is glad to see plans for real-time air monitors in the largely Latinx neighborhoods around the facility.
She isn t sure people in the community are ready to trust the company, the state or the city to run those networks.
“Our own independent monitors would inspire greater trust amongst our community,” Gonzalez said. “That’s what we re trying to do here.”
Gonzalez is the executive director of Cultivando, a Commerce City nonprofit that helps residents get involved in local politics. The organization is now bidding to build air monitors to track pollutants escaping the Suncor facility, Colorado’s only oil and gas refinery.