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NOThe new guidelines from the World Health Organization (WHO) have reset the criteria for acceptable air pollution. The guideline for nitrogen dioxide has been reduced by 75% and that for particulate matter pollution (PM2.5) has been halved. Now it is up to governments, industry and communities to rise to the challenge.
It would be easy to focus on the most polluted places in the world and think that clean air is unachievable. But the WHO guidelines are based on air pollution conditions that already exist. For example, particle pollution levels in many cities in North America and Scandinavia already meet the new guidelines. Many large cities, including Vancouver, Honolulu, and Stockholm, also have very low particulate matter pollution.
One thing they have in common is their remoteness. Particulate pollution can stay in the air for a week or more, which means that a city’s air pollution affects its neighbors. This is a challenge for the densely populated UK and Western Europe. The pollution inhaled in Cardiff today may have been produced yesterday in London or Paris and tomorrow it could be in Newcastle or Amsterdam. Cities will have to take responsibility for their pollution downwind. They must work together, and work with the rural areas around them, in the same way that river pollution must be managed from source to sea.
It is also clear that we cannot meet the guidelines by focusing only on transport and industry. As Professor Stefan Reis of the UK Center for Ecology and Hydrology explained, meeting UK guidelines “will require action across Europe to reduce emissions. It will be vital to control emissions from agriculture and residential burning, in addition to further reducing traffic emissions. “
This was taken up by Professor Ally Lewis of the University of York. “The center and south-east of England, as well as our close neighbors in Europe, are densely populated and particulate pollution easily crosses borders, which means that international cooperation is vital. However, we are a long way from achieving the goals of improving air quality, and there are relatively easy targets for improving public health.
“It is indefensible that as a society we have chosen to inefficiently burn solid fuels, i.e. wood or charcoal, in homes in cities, mainly because it looks good. And while vehicle pollution decreases over time, we will live with the internal combustion engine for decades. Getting older, more polluting vehicles off the road is a clear and guaranteed victory for air quality.
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