The State of Air Pollution in Europe

The European Environment - State and Outlook 2010 - Air Pollution (46 page pdf, European Environment Agency, 2010)

The report reviewed today is an overview of the progress (or lack of progress) being made or forecast in Europe to meet EU objectives. Clearly, the main challenge has to do with particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide and managing the main sources: hydro plants and transportation. One striking observation is that as electric vehicles are introduced to reduce urban emissions, rural areas may suffer as the sites of expanded electric generating utilities.



Key Quotes:

“only 14 European countries expect to comply with all four pollutant-specific emission ceilings set under EU and international legislation for 2010.. The upper limit for nitrogen oxides (NOX) is the most challenging — 12 countries expect to exceed it, some by as much as 50 %”

“An estimated 5 million years of lost life per year are due to fine particles (PM2.5) alone”

“The energy sector remains a large source of air pollution, accounting for around 70 % of Europe's sulphur oxides (SOX) emissions and 21 % of NOX output despite significant reductions since 1990. Road transport is another important source of pollution”

“Over the past decade, 20–50 % of the urban population was exposed to PM10 concentrations in excess of the EU daily limit values set for the protection of human health..While the annual average limit value of 40 μg/m3 is regularly exceeded at several urban background and traffic stations, there are hardly any exceedances at rural background locations”

“PM2.5 pollution in EEA-32 countries may be associated with approximately 500 000 premature deaths in 2005. This corresponds to about 5 million years of life lost “

“the largest proportional decreases are projected for emissions of NOX and SO2 — a reduction of some 45 % by 2020 in the absence of additional measures “

“future large scale uptake of electric vehicles could lead to significant benefits arising from the displacement of harmful air pollutants from urban to rural areas (where fossil-fuelled power stations are typically situated) where population exposure is lower.”

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The Application of Air Quality Models in Europe

The application of models under the European Union's Air Quality Directive: A technical reference guide (76 page pdf, European Environment Agency, Sep. 2011)

Also discussed here: The Forum for Air Quality Modelling (FAIRMODE)

And here: FAIRMODE: Forthcoming policy needs - EU Air Policy Review (21 slide PowerPoint, Joachim D’Eugenio, FAIRMODE, Aug. 8, 2011)
Today’s focus is on the application of air quality models in Europe, noting the limitations and benefits of models in combination with ground-based or space-based monitors. There are several very useful tables showing the policy standards for a range of air pollutants for various applications and scales.



Key Quotes:

“In May 2008, the European Parliament and the Council adopted a new consolidated European Union (EU) Directive on ambient air quality and cleaner air for Europe.. the new AQ Directive encourages the use of AQ models in combination with monitoring in a range of applications”

“Modelling is also used extensively in air quality forecasts, providing next-day and near real‑time information to the public and for the implementation of short-term action plans….required in the AQ Directive when concentrations exceed, or are expected to exceed, alert and information thresholds”

“Assessment should occur at sites where the concentrations are highest, …in regard to the positioning of traffic sites .. these 'shall be at least 25 m from the edge of major junctions and no more than 10 m from the kerbside..For industrial areas, concentrations should be representative of a 250 x 250 m2 area; for traffic emissions, the assessment should be representative for a 100-m street segment”

“On a daily basis, Member States are obliged to inform the public first and foremost of any exceedances of the information and alert thresholds..These exceedances will generally be based on monitoring”

• information on observed exceedance(s);
• information on the forecast for the following afternoon/day(s), including the geographical area of expected exceedances and the expected trends in the air pollution;
• information on the type of population concerned, possible health effects and recommended behaviour;
• information on preventive action to reduce pollution and/or exposure.

“models are used for the following activities:

• identifying source contributions from within the zone;
• identifying transboundary or long-range source contributions external to the zone;
• calculating changes in concentrations as a result of different emission scenarios;
• calculating the population exposure, and its changes, under different emission scenarios.

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Population Exposure to Vehicle Emissions

Image via WikipediaHoning the Methods: Assessing Population Exposures to Motor Vehicle Exhaust (28 page pdf, Chris Van Atten,Michael Brauer,Tami Funk, Nicolas L. Gilbert,Lisa Graham,Debra Kaden,Paul J. Miller,Leonora Rojas Bracho,Amanda Wheeler,and Ronald H. White, Commission for Environmental Cooperation, Nov, 2004)

Today’s article under review is the result of a major international workshop convened in Montreal Canada in 2003 to consider recommendations for assessing exposure to vehicle emissions and the resulting health impacts, especially to young children and the elderly. It points out one application of a California law forbidding school sites within 500 ft of traffic. A caution is expressed about the widespread urges of urban planners towards intensification which may present new health hazards to the denser populations in the urban core.

Key Quotes:

“we provide an overview of the emerging policy requirements, along with a conceptual framework for motor vehicle exhaust exposure assessments that can help inform policy decisions”

“The new [California] law prohibits the approval of school sites within 500 feet of the edge of the closest traffic lane of a freeway or other busy traffic corridor unless the school district determines that air quality levels at the proposed site do not pose either a significant short-term or long-term risk to pupils“

“The policy of promoting the infilling of residential housing in urban central core areas, while beneficial for the economic revitalization of these areas and reducing urban sprawl and VMT, could also increase the population potentially exposed to high levels of motor vehicle emissions, especially from heavy-duty vehicles”

“Having monitors located in representative sites for population exposures to vehicle exhaust is clearly an important assessment need”

“Researchers should work with transportation planners to identify potential “hot spots” along existing major routes or at sites of proposed highway expansion projects as candidates for exposure assessments”

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Air Pollution Preconditions for Heart Attacks

A retrospective cohort study of stroke onset: Implications for characterizing short term effects from ambient air pollution (27 page pdf, Julie YM Johnson, Paul J Villeneuve, Dion Pasichnyk and Brian H Rowe, Environmental Health, Oct. 6, 2011)

Today we review an interesting look at what difference it makes when using the date that a stroke patient is taken to hospital (vs. the time of stroke onset) and using the level of local pollution at the residence(vs. ambient level for city). Conclusion is that it makes little difference in this case- but may when the patient is more mobile or when the patient is exposed to pockets of high pollution.



Key Quotes:

“the onset of stroke symptoms frequently occurred more than one full calendar day before hospital admission, and that the impact from this misclassification of the timing of stroke onset produces air pollution risk estimates that may be understated by as much as 40%”

“a study of models of traffic-related pollution estimates that included time-activity patterns suggested that the difference between the mobility-based model and residence-only models may lead to risk estimates biased toward the null”

“to examine the extent of misclassification of exposure based on data on patient residence and hospital admission time and date to increase our understanding of the possible biases in ambient air pollution risk estimates arising from the use of administrative datasets.”

“A systematic difference in ambient NO2 and PM2.5 levels could not be detected between day of stroke onset and day of presentation to hospital”

“a very high proportion of stroke patients were indoors during stroke onset…adult Canadians spend more than ¾ of their time indoors, even in summer months.. Personal exposure to NO2 and PM2.5 can be different than background exposure measurements, and in Canada the difference can be dependent on season, the use of gas heating, gas stoves, and air conditioning”

“Our data suggest that day of presentation and residential location data obtained from administrative records reasonably captures the time and location of stroke onset for most patient”

Related articles

• The Link Between Air Pollution and Asthma (everydayhealth.com)
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Air Pollution Exposure and the Health of Neighbourhoods in Ottawa, Canada

Air Pollution and Health: Toward Improving the Spatial Definition of Exposure, Susceptibility and Risk (Marie-Pierre Parenteau, PhD Thesis, Dept of Geography, University of Ottawa, 2011)

Also discussed here: Development of Neighborhoods to Measure Spatial Indicators of Health (255 page pdf, Marie-Pierre Parenteau, Michael Sawada, Elizabeth A. Kristjansson, Melissa Calhoun, Stephanie Leclair, Ronald Labonté, Vivien Runnels, Anne Musiol, and Sam Herold, Volume 20 • No. 2 • 2008, Journal of the Urban and Regional Information Systems Association, pp 43-55, Jul. 1, 2008)

The focus today is an assessment of whether “where one lives impacts one’s health“ holds true at the “inter-urban” scale for 90 neighbourhoods (defined using a number of social indicators) in Ottawa, Canada’s 4^th largest city. While no statistical association was found between spatial variations of NO2 and community health, despite the established general link in the literature for individuals between pollution and health i.e. the health of an individual is determined by much more than the air pollution near their residence. Ottawa is surrounded by a “greenbelt” (shown as a low pollution yellow on the figure below) which is also close to most of residential Ottawa, while the downtown core, where most people work and fewer live, has many pollution hotspots. As the author points out, exposure and mobility need to be considered when assessing health impacts.

Key Quotes:

“Transportation is the main contributor to air pollution in Ottawa: > 50% of O3 at ground level, 90% of CO, > 85% of NOx and approximately 60% of SO2 measured are caused by transportation activities”

“The areas with the highest NO2 concentrations on the LUR surface are for the most part associated to the location of small industrial parks.. Another important element .. is the large linear area characterized by lower NO2 concentrations that surrounds the urban core of the city…. the greenbelt”

“The use of three different spatial representations confirms there is no measurable effect of NO2 exposure in Ottawa…the lack of a relationship between exposure to NO2 and respiratory morbidity may have been the result of inexact correspondence between the neighbourhood boundaries and the ecological properties that shape health processes…

“Much of the published work on the relationship between NO2 exposure and health has focused on the differences between metropolitan centers, herein referred to as inter-urban differences. As such, at the opposite end, there is a poor understanding of the role that variations in NO2 have on health across a given metropolitan area, herein referred to as intra-urban scale”

“This research demonstrates the necessity of addressing scale more strategically in health research as it can have an effect on the representation of exposure, susceptibility and consequently on the assessment of the relationship between exposure and health”

“an effort should be made to include daily mobility into the estimate of exposure to NO2”

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Economic Response to Cordon Congestion Pricing

The Economics of Cordon Tolling: General Equilibrium and Welfare Analysis (50 page, pdf, Alex Anas and Tomoru Hiramatsu, State University of New York at Buffalo, Oct.8. 2011)

The focus today is one an analysis of the toll-avoidance reactions of commuters who live within or outside a cardon in a large city in the USA (Chicago). Using a model, the authors concluded that cordon pricing affects real estate, transit use and economic activities such as location of businesses. The toll charge and the area cordoned are two basic drivers.



Key Quotes:

“Cordon tolling is considered successful in having reduced congestion and emissions, although the environmental benefits are secondary in magnitude compared to the time savings”

“The effects and benefits of cordon tolling can be quite different when public transit is not available or if it is available but its availability is limited by congestion at transit stations”

“A $14 toll per crossing maximizes welfare, achieving 65% of the gains from Pigouvian pricing on all major roads. About 16% of the downtown cordon’s welfare gains are from toll revenue, 34% from annualized real estate value gains and 50% from consumer utility”

“ Bigger cordons around the City of Chicago and around the City and its inner suburbs are also studied. In the case of the last cordon, toll-avoidance causes jobs, residences and real output to increase within the cordon”

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Roundabouts as a Strategy to Improve Air Quality

Modern Roundabouts, Global Warming, and Emissions Reductions: Status of Research, And Opportunities for North America (16 page pdf, Tony Redington, Canadian Transportation Research Forum, May 2001)

Also discussed here: Modern Roundabouts and the Environment (Road Commission of Washtenaw County)

And here: Air Quality and Modern Roundabouts (Wisconsin Dept Transportation, Aug, 21, 2008)

And here: Auto Roundabouts Reduce Fuel Consumption, Air Pollution 20-30%! (The Optimistic Futurist, Mar. 26, 2011)

The focus today is on how roundabouts can and are being used as a tool to reduce vehicle emissions at intersections compared to the use of traffic lights. The introduction of 100 roundabouts in Vermont was expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 8%, addition to significantly fewer collisions and fatalities at intersections



Key Quotes:

“Modeling and empirical studies of busy highway intersections document a substantial short term benefit from installing modern roundabouts. Motor fuel consumption and associated air pollutants are reduced, and the primary global warming gas (GHG), CO_2, is significantly cut.”

“The US Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) Mobile 5 model (Mobile) does not contain a module that effectively models intersection performance.”

“The magnitude of impact from roundabouts on Vermont statewide motor fuel use is suggested by a hypothetical installation of roundabouts in place of signals at 100 busy intersections.. According to models, this change would decrease total annual motor fuel use by approximately 8% of 1997 statewide consumption.”

“25 roundabouts replacing existing traffic signals in the City of Burlington, Vermont would equate to over 20% of that City’s goal of bringing GHG emissions to 10% below the base line 1990 level”

“At the metropolitan level, the roundabout savings at busy intersections represents a tool to meet the Burlington goal of reducing 2005 GHGs generation by 256,000 tons. Transforming 25 signalized intersections with substantial traffic volumes would.. amount to about 61,000 tons of CO₂..based on assuming 250,000 annual reduction in fuel use per intersection average and 19.57 pounds of CO₂ per gallon of motor fuel”

“The City of Carmel, Indiana. found that when roundabouts replaced traditional intersections, accidents with injury reduced by 78%, and that cost of construction of a roundabout was $125,000 less than constructing an intersection with traffic lights”

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