Air pollution across London and health impacts of air quality

Air pollution across London and health impacts of air quality The need for local air pollution assessment Gary Fuller King’s College London 17th October 2013 [email protected]

London past and present RH- Houses of Parliament, Effect of Sun in the Fog, Claude Monet 1900, oil on canvas 81 x 92 cm, Private Collection. London. LH-Claude Monet. London. The Waterloo Bridge. 1903. Oil on canvas. The Carnegi Institute, Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, USA Lower centre -http://www.blipfoto.com/entry/2775726

As a result of poor air quality: • UK population lost 340,000 years of life in 2008 • This loss of life is equivalent to 29,000 deaths •The burden can also be represented as a loss of life expectancy from birth (for everyone) of 6 months

Published December 2010 3

As a result of poor air quality:

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Published June 2010 funded by the GLA 4

PM2.5 has an impact on mortality equivalent to 4,267 deaths in London in 2008, within a range of 756 to 7,965.

NO2 (nitrogen dioxide) Widespread breaches of the AQS Objective and EU LV by up to 2-3x in 2012 The EU LV was set in 1999 to be met by 2010. In now we are projecting (hoping for) attainment in the mid 2020s

NO2 Decreases in background NO2 not seen close to roads. Some evidence of a roadside decrease since ~2010 Need to be cautious about recent trends – might be driven by weather conditions.

NO2

Testing tens of thousands of vehicles in real world driving conditions shows Euroclass technology isn’t abating diesel NOX (Carslaw and Rhys- Tyler, 2013).

PM10

2012 vs the AQS objective / EU LV

PM10 Trends only possible since 2004 Probable that changes in the regional background are driving the apparent decrease in PM across site types. Evidence is mixed over progressive abatement of PM from traffic

PM2.5

FDMS and partisol measurements only

O3 Widespread breaches of the AQS Objective despite the miserable summer Decreases in London decrement as observed by AQEG (2009)

Particle number concentration Change due to introduction of ultra low sulphur diesel but other large, poorly understood, sources remain including airports

Local air pollution assessment Government recently consulted on options for the future of local air quality management. Most options would lead to a weakening / complete removal of local assessments. National assessments might be OK for EU compliance but not for local air quality management

National vs local air pollution assessment

National vs local air pollution assessment

Conclusions Very large breaches of the AQS/ LV for NO2 in London (and elsewhere in the UK). Background NO2 has decreased and there is some indication of slight decrease in road NO2 since 2010 but the picture is complex.

AQS/LV compliance for PM10 is marginal, depending on the sites considered and assessment methods. Changes in air pollution in London over the last ~ 10 years show the successful abatement of pollution from petrol vehicles but the same success has not be achieved for diesels and there’s a lot more of them these days! Some pollutants have decreased including particle number, CO and SO2 due to industrial emissions control, three way catalysts on petrol cars and improved fuel quality. O3 should not be ignored as concentrations in London rise towards regional background and the regional background itself is slowly increasing (AQEG, 2009). National assessments might be OK for EU compliance but ending local air quality assessment may mask pollution problems in many areas where people are exposed and may also lead to money wasted on non-optimal solutions.

Thanks This presentation has involved the crunching of 10s of millions of air pollution measurements – mainly by Louise Mittal.

Thank you all the London boroughs, GLA, Defra and TfL who support the London Air Quality Network enabling this unique London-wide perspective. [email protected] www.londonair.org.uk