Microproduct Data GuideBeginner

British Columbia Hourly PM2.5

Preliminary British Columbia fine-particle station readings for inspecting hourly particulate concentrations and their observation times.

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At a Glance

Difficulty
Beginner — comfortable for a first prototype
Size
Tiny · ≤0.01 GB
Formats
CSV
Access
Download
API Key
Not Required
Provider
Government of British Columbia
Updates
Near Real Time
Last Verified
Sep 28, 2026
Source Type
Government Source
Data Terms
B.C. Open Government Licence 2.0 with provincial attribution. These hourly values are unverified and exclude Metro Vancouver and Fraser Valley data.
  • Python Syntax Checked
  • Runnable Notebook

From Source to Product Signal

Test a Product Idea in Four Steps

B.C. publishes an unverified PM2.5 CSV and a station metadata CSV. Start with five lines from the current pollutant file using a streaming read; the full file is several megabytes. The catalog record confirms its OGL-BC licence and warns that Metro Vancouver and Fraser Valley readings are excluded. These concentrations are not provider-reported AQI values.

1

Check the Setup

  • Python 3.10 or newer
  • An internet connection
  • The requests Python package
2

Access the Data

  1. 1.Read the B.C. catalog record, geographic exclusions, and licence.
  2. 2.Stream the official PM2.5 CSV and inspect five data rows.
  3. 3.Join station names to official station metadata before mapping.
Open Official Source
3

Run the Python Example

Install the packages, then run the notebook cell.

python -m pip install requests

import csv
import itertools
import requests

url = ("https://www.env.gov.bc.ca/epd/bcairquality/aqo/csv/"
       "Hourly_Raw_Air_Data/Air_Quality/PM25.csv")
with requests.get(url, stream=True, timeout=30) as response:
    response.raise_for_status()
    rows = csv.DictReader(response.iter_lines(decode_unicode=True))
    for row in itertools.islice(rows, 5):
        print(row["STATION_NAME"], row["DATE_PST"], row["RAW_VALUE"], row["UNITS"])
4

Test a Useful Signal

Inspect B.C. Hourly PM2.5

Review five preliminary observations before station mapping.

  1. 01Keep station ID or name, timestamp, unit, and concentration.
  2. 02Check quality and coverage before deriving a local AQI estimate.
  3. 03Explain why a missing station is not evidence of clean air.

Related Datasets

Dataset Details

Government of British Columbia is a government source. Last verified 2026-09-28. Temporal coverage: recent unverified hourly PM2.5 readings.

Data Types

Time Series

Formats

CSV

Provider

Government of British Columbia

Data Terms

B.C. Open Government Licence 2.0 with provincial attribution. These hourly values are unverified and exclude Metro Vancouver and Fraser Valley data.

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