Google has been testing air quality reports in web search and other products for a while now. Although the company apparently hasn’t made an official announcement, air quality reports are now available in a Google search in the US.
As I spotted it 9to5Google, searching for “air quality” followed by a city or other location now shows a map with pins at the locations where the air quality sensor is located. Below the map is a list of all ambient air sensors and an Air Quality Index (AQI).
Google search results for “Atlanta air quality”
Google’s air quality information is based on two sources, AirNow And Purple Air. AirNow is jointly operated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Park Service, NASA, the Centers for Disease Control, and several tribal, state, and local air quality agencies. PurpleAir collects data from a worldwide “community of citizen scientists,” using air sensors developed and sold by the company.
Google releases India’s first air quality resultsin November, but the company was also testing it on US smart displays as early as October.
It is not clear when the functionality will appear in other Google products with weather reports, such as Google Weather app / interface, the Wear OS weather box, the Google “at-a-glance” widget, and other services. Air quality reports are becoming increasingly more important in the United States, as climate change contributes to them The longest and harshest bushfire seasonswhich often causes smoke and other particulates to travel across the country.
Google Search has rolled out other new features over the past few months, such as the option to quickly delete the last 15 minutes of your search history and listings for appointment times at select medical clinics. Google also tweaks its search algorithms to highlight high-quality product reviews.
source: 9to5Google
