The Wood Buffalo Environmental Association is releasing the first results of its odour monitoring program.

WBEA launched their Community Odour Monitoring Program App in September 2017 which encourages residents to share information if they smell any type of odour across Wood Buffalo.

Program Lead Emilie Briggs tells Mix News this data will help them see whether there are any relationships between these smells and air quality.

“We were trying to find a way to get people’s input so that we knew when, exactly what time, and what days people were experiencing odours so we had a precise point in time that we could go back and actually look at the data.”

The results are from September 2017 to December 2018.

Multiple smells were observed with asphalt topping the list with 141 reported instances.

“The next most common, but by half as much, was sulphur and then we had fuel odour types and actually smoke was the third least common.” added Briggs.

Also included was ammonia, fecal, and other smells.

Moving forward, the WBEA is hoping to see more participation from people across Wood Buffalo.

Briggs says they want to continuing having individual reports for each community across the region.

“If people in Fort Chipewyan are experiencing odours they’re probably not the same odours people in Conklin are experiencing, so because we do have air monitoring stations in all those communities we’re able to do community specific breakdowns.”

The app is free and can be downloaded at wbea.org/apps or at google play and Apple app stores.