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Are you one of 38 million in the UK living in areas with illegal air pollution?

A new study shows that people living in Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield and many more local authorities live with NO2 levels above the legal limit

Almost 40 million people in the UK are currently living in areas clouded by health-damaging and illegal levels of pollution from diesel vehicles, according to a study commissioned by the Labour party.

This study, which found that 59.3% of the UK population living in local authorities across the country from Bournemouth to Leeds are currently being choked by illegal levels of fumes, will only add fuel to that fire.

Those illegal levels are defined as breaching the lawful level of 40 microgrammes of nitrogen dioxide per cubic metre of air.

The locations affected by illegally high levels of NO2 aren't localised to one part of the country either. Residents in local authorities from Bournemouth all the way up to Aberdeen are reportedly suffering under illegal levels of NO2 levels.

Reports from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs show that nitrogen dioxide emissions from diesel cars cause over half of the 40,000 premature deaths from air pollution each year.

In April last year, MPs said air pollution was a public health emergency and earlier this week we reported that many people are questioning whether the poor state of our air negates the positive impact cycling has on our health.

>Read more: Can pollution cut the health benefits of cycling to work?

And air quality isn't just on the news agenda here at road.cc. Since the announcement that a snap general election will take place on June 8 was made earlier in the week conversations about air quality have been abound.

The fact that this study was commissioned by the Labour party will come as no surprise to some of our readers. Party leader Jeremy Corbyn is himself a cyclist and his party has been outspoken on the issue of air pollution in recent weeks.

>Read more: Jeremy Corbyn on his bike before May calls snap general election

Speaking to the Guardian, shadow secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs, Sue Hayman, has spoken about Labour's plans to to bring in a new clean air act to tackle the national scandal that the current air pollution crisis represents.

“Labour will not allow the Tories to use the snap general election or Brexit to kick this issue into the long grass or water down standards that would put millions of UK adults and children at risk,” said Hayman.

The publication of this study has come after the government lodged a bid to delay an incoming plan to tackle the air pollution crisis.

Judges had ordered the government to come up with a tough new plan to tackle air quality issues by Monday April 24, as the high court said that current measures were so poor they could essentially be classed as unlawful.

London's Mayor and member of the Labour Party has also come on record criticising the current air quality plan and had called for a new one.

“I am deeply disappointed that ministers have missed a golden opportunity to show real leadership and urgently introduce new plans to deal with our filthy air,” he said.

“This could have been done well before the pre-election period started had the government treated this as a priority as I do. Instead they have used the general and local elections as a smokescreen to hide their incompetence as they seek to extend the court-ordered deadline for publishing their draft plan.”

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12 comments

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BehindTheBikesheds | 6 years ago
0 likes

I'm not cherry picking anything, read where I said I got the info from. read where the info originates from. i stated that petrol puts out more pollution than diesel.

the rest is another commenter as i stated and the info from TFL

Avatar
madcarew replied to BehindTheBikesheds | 6 years ago
1 like

BehindTheBikesheds wrote:

I'm not cherry picking anything, read where I said I got the info from. read where the info originates from. i stated that petrol puts out more pollution than diesel.

the rest is another commenter as i stated and the info from TFL

 

I did read where you got it from; From your link.

"Particulates in London come more from petrol cars than diesel ones. THESE ARE FACTS and you can see them in the TFL air quality document I link to below"

These aren't facts that are supported by the material in the link. Stating that more pollution comes from diesel cars is disingenuous or cherry picking. There is far more pollution from diesel engines. The 'fact' that there is more 'pollution' from petrol than diesel is simply wrong; petrol cars produce more pollution than diesel cars in toto simply because there are more petrol cars than diesel cars. Your facts are wrong, based on cherry picked numbers from the document. Nothing in the document backs up your claim "petrol puts out more pollution than diesel."

 

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crazy-legs | 6 years ago
2 likes

Quite interestingly, you can observe the effects of vehicles by looking at street-level pollution data immediately after large-scale vehicle restrictions such as during the London Marathon, RideLondon sportive and so on.

Immediate, drastic decreases in street level NOx pollutants, most noticeable in the high pollution spots such as Trafalgar Square and Oxford Street.

Next day as traffic is back to nromal and bag, it's through the roof again.

Meanwhile the Mayor is making various sweeping statements about his absolute commitment to maybe thinking about doing something at some point in the not-too-distant future. All nice and woolly.

It needs immediate and drastic action - not sticking paster solutions of a "pollution charge".

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FluffyKittenofT... | 6 years ago
1 like

"If the level of NOX or particulates rise on an occasional basis due to unusual meteorological levels, this does not mean that 60% of the population are being poisoned."

But the frequency of 'unusual meterological levels" over time is likely to be constant (ignoring climate change for the moment!). So if those spikes in NOx occur more often in a location, it's likely that that location has generally high levels of pollution.

Having looked at the TfL report (or, 'puff piece', depending on how much one trusts TfL - that report seems quite keen on 'targets' and 'projections', which always inspires scepticism) it answers some of the questions, to be fair.

But I'd still like to know how they obtained those figures. I don't think one can put any faith in lab measurements of emissions by vehicles.

As well as the proven 'fiddling' the manufacturers have engaged in, every source seems to agree that levels can increase dramatically if there are any imperfections in the vehicle's engine. And given the number of cars I see with visible clouds of black crud pouring out of their exhaust, and the frequent stories of garages simply removing failed catalytic converters, I suspect UK vehicles are generally not maintained in perfect, rolling-off-the-production-line condition.

Also, even the figures in that TfL document, indicate that diesel vehicles contribute twice as much to particulate emissions in London as do petrol vehicles (it's just that many of those diesel vehicles are not cars).

Also, this seems relevant

http://www.livescience.com/52284-volkswagen-scandal-clean-diesel-challen...

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FluffyKittenofT... | 6 years ago
0 likes

@Behindthebikesheds

Those are pretty incomplete 'facts', though.

What _size_ are those particulates? That's pretty important - it makes a big difference to the health effects.

Are they based on real world street-level measurements (if so, how did they determine what was coming from which source?) or the bogus lab test figures for diesel?

Another point against black cabs, though, I see.

In any case, the problem is motorised vehicles, whether diesel or petrol, and that's what needs to be addressed.

Fair point that heating systems might not have had enough attention (though surely that effect would be seasonal?)

Avatar
BehindTheBikesheds | 6 years ago
1 like

And yet the levels of pollution on our roads come more from petrol than diesel.

Here is a comment and some actual facts lifted from a commenter on the grauniad;

"The limits are specified at two levels, average levels and occasional incident levels.

If the level of NOX or particulates rise on an occasional basis due to unusual meteorological levels, this does not mean that 60% of the population are being poisoned.

If you had the level of smoke in your house 24/7 that you have when you are barbecuing in the garden or the park, you would soon be in trouble, but you don't and you aren't, so your burning of sausages or steak makes no difference to your life span. It is the same with air pollution.

The facts are these:

At a few congested sites - mostly in London, there is unacceptable pollution. Half of it comes from taxis. more than 23% of it comes from space heating, commercial and domestic and industry. 11% of the NOX in London air come from diesel cars. 29% of London's NOX comes from goods vehicles, buses and taxis..

Particulates in London come more from petrol cars than diesel ones. THESE ARE FACTS and you can see them in the TFL air quality document I link to below

This distorting article selects only one source and by far not the biggest - diesel cars.

See this TFL Mayor of London analysis of the sources of London's air pollution.

Figure 2

diesel car NOX contribution to overall nox 11%
TFL Bus NOX contribution to overall nox 8%
Goods vehicles NOX contribution to overall nox 17%
Gas heating NOX contribution to overall nox 16%
Machinery NOX contribution to overall nox 14%

Fig 3 Particulate Emissions % of whole.

Petrol cars 17%
Diesel Cars 11%
Goods vehicles 13%
Industry and heating 7%
Non mobile machinery 13%

http://content.tfl.gov.uk/transport-emissions-roadmap.pdf

Avatar
P3t3 replied to BehindTheBikesheds | 6 years ago
3 likes

BehindTheBikesheds wrote:

The facts are these:

At a few congested sites - mostly in London, there is unacceptable pollution. Half of it comes from taxis. more than 23% of it comes from space heating, commercial and domestic and industry. 11% of the NOX in London air come from diesel cars. 29% of London's NOX comes from goods vehicles, buses and taxis..

But it isn't "a few congested sites" though is it.  Its virtually every traffic-clogged high street in the country.  

Avatar
madcarew replied to BehindTheBikesheds | 6 years ago
1 like

BehindTheBikesheds wrote:

And yet the levels of pollution on our roads come more from petrol than diesel.

 

The facts are these:

At a few congested sites - mostly in London, there is unacceptable pollution. Half of it comes from taxis. more than 23% of it comes from space heating, commercial and domestic and industry. 11% of the NOX in London air come from diesel cars. 29% of London's NOX comes from goods vehicles, buses and taxis..

Particulates in London come more from petrol cars than diesel ones. THESE ARE FACTS and you can see them in the TFL air quality document I link to below

This distorting article selects only one source and by far not the biggest - diesel cars.

See this TFL Mayor of London analysis of the sources of London's air pollution.

Figure 2

diesel car NOX contribution to overall nox 11%
TFL Bus NOX contribution to overall nox 8%
Goods vehicles NOX contribution to overall nox 17%
Gas heating NOX contribution to overall nox 16%
Machinery NOX contribution to overall nox 14%

Fig 3 Particulate Emissions % of whole.

Petrol cars 17%
Diesel Cars 11%
Goods vehicles 13%
Industry and heating 7%
Non mobile machinery 13%

http://content.tfl.gov.uk/transport-emissions-roadmap.pdf

Unfortunately you're cherry picking your 'facts' Behindthebikesheds. For sure the figures show that NOx from Cars comes more from petrol than diesel (but what is the ratio of petrol to diesel cars on the road?) It is a un-contestable fact that diesel engines produce more particulate matter than petrol.

From that same document Petrol cars 17% of PM, Diesel 11%, but when light goods, Rigid goods, Artic goods, Taxis and other diesel transport taken into account the contribution from diesel as a transport fuel is 30%, and petrol is 18%. Similarly for NOx.

Avatar
burtthebike | 6 years ago
3 likes

Just reported in the news that the government are being taken to court because of their failure to meet air pollution targets.

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CXR94Di2 replied to burtthebike | 6 years ago
4 likes

burtthebike wrote:

Just reported in the news that the government are being taken to court because of their failure to meet air pollution targets.

 

This has been going on for quite a few years from various governments.  Environmentalists have taken the government to court several times and this final court case last week gave the governement a matter of days to come up with a credible plan to reduce pollution levels.  The last proposal was rejected by the court as worthless.  

 

We all have to accept that vehicles and transport  infrastructure has to change.  It is going to impact upon all aspects of life, vehicles will get more expensive to take anywhere, especially cities/town,  the performance of vehicles will be reduced to improve on their emmisions to actually meet Euro 6(whilst being driven, not a laboratory result).  The worst polluting vehicles will need to either banned or scrapped, some sort of scrappage incentive will need to be introduced.

I have moved away from diesel cars, and will be trading in our last car for an full electric for local journeys

Avatar
burtthebike | 6 years ago
4 likes

And yet there are plenty of local authorities which clearly put driving above the health of their constituents, building more roads to cope with congestion in a never ending spiral of futility.  My own for instance, South Gloucestershire council. 

They recently got a few million from central government to address congestion, and they have a very clear congestion policy, which starts with providing for pedestrians and cyclists and ends with road building and widening.  You can guess what they are actually doing.

They also have clear policies about air pollution and health, including, you guessed, priority for active travel.

Avatar
CXR94Di2 | 6 years ago
3 likes

It going to cost, not just direct costs but knock on for GDP for the UK. You can't put a cost on health, can you?

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