Air Quality in Urban Environments
Issues in Environmental Science and Technology
Book review by Jo Barnes
ECG Committee Member
Air Quality Management Resource Centre, University of the West of England
ECG Bulletin January 2010
ECG Committee Member
Air Quality Management Resource Centre, University of the West of England
ECG Bulletin January 2010
Air Quality in Urban Environments is the 28th volume in the RSC Series, ‘Issues in Environmental Science and Technology’. Related previous titles include: Air Quality Management (No. 8); Air Pollution and Health (No. 10); and Transport and the Environment (No. 20). The seven chapters in this latest volume, edited by Professors Ronald Hester (York) and Roy Harrison (Birmingham), provide a comprehensive overview of the issues within urban air quality, including sources, health effects, dispersion and policy response.
The opening chapter, by Ole Hertel (NERI) and Michael Evan Goodsite (Aarhus), compares urban air pollution throughout the major cities of the world. The authors highlight the predominance of traffic emissions, contributions of trans-boundary pollutants, and the acute levels of exposure experienced in mega-cites, particularly in developing nations These levels are a stark contrast and valuable perspective for those of us managing concentrations that are at least within sight of the air quality objectives! The chapter also introduces the inherent complexities introduced by geography, topography and meteorology, the final point of which is taken up and expanded on in the following chapter by Jennifer A. Salmond (Auckland) and Ian G. McKendry (British Columbia). This second chapter discusses the local, urban and regional-scale atmospheric processes that affect pollutant transport and dispersal, the complex feedback mechanisms that make street-level concentrations difficult to predict, and the potential of informed urban design to reduce pollutant build-up.
In the third chapter, William Bloss (Birmingham) focuses on these complex chemical processes in the urban atmosphere, specifically the short-timescale reactions arising from traffic emissions and uncertainties in the current scientific understanding.
While the majority of urban air-quality problems result from road traffic, higher concentrations of some pollutants may also be experienced by underground commuters around the world, with unknown health implications, according to Imre Salma’s (University of Eotvos) report in Chapter four.
Unregulated indoor exposure to air pollutants may be a dominant contributor to human health insults. In the fifth chapter, Sotiris Vardoulakis (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) provides a review of personal exposure assessment techniques which, he argues, should complement ambient air quality limit values, exposure reduction objectives and vehicle emissions and other standards in targeting air pollution in indoor and outdoor environments.
Robert L. Maynard (HPA) updates us, in the penultimate chapter, on the current research into the health effects of specific pollutants: particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, ozone, carbon monoxide and carcinogens, such as benzene, 1,3-butadiene, PAHs and arsenic. Key findings suggest that, contrary to the message conveyed by the setting of air quality objectives, there is no threshold of effect for many common pollutants; that long-term exposure to particulate matter leads primarily to cardiovascular, rather than respiratory, disease; and that ultrafine, or nanoparticles, may be the most toxicologically active (though the epidemiology on this is not clear).
The final chapter from Martin Williams (Defra) provides a historical perspective on UK air-quality policy development over the last 50 years. He discusses the role of the policy-maker in interpreting the science and in determining acceptable risk, evaluates the effectiveness of national instruments, hints at the limitations of the current system of air quality management based on achieving objective concentrations and advocates combination with the exposure-reduction approach to more equitably and cost-effectively protect public health, challenging air quality managers and policy-makers to ‘think creatively’ to achieve this goal. Finally, Williams examines the synergistic opportunities for tackling air quality and climate change as the focus for strategic urban policy development in the near future.
As a very broad overview of a complex subject, I would concur with the editors’ recommendation of this book to air-quality practitioners in central and local government, consultancies and industry, environmentalists, policy-makers and students of environmental science, engineering and management courses. The book could equally inform interested non-experts, arguably the most valuable target audience to initiate changes necessary for improvements in air quality.
Caveat: the views presented here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the University of the West of England.
Air Quality in Urban Environments
Issues in Environmental Science and Technology
Editors: R. M. Harrison and R. E. Hester,
The Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, UK, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-84755-907-4, http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/9781847559654
(Hardback); pp xii + 162; £54.95
The opening chapter, by Ole Hertel (NERI) and Michael Evan Goodsite (Aarhus), compares urban air pollution throughout the major cities of the world. The authors highlight the predominance of traffic emissions, contributions of trans-boundary pollutants, and the acute levels of exposure experienced in mega-cites, particularly in developing nations These levels are a stark contrast and valuable perspective for those of us managing concentrations that are at least within sight of the air quality objectives! The chapter also introduces the inherent complexities introduced by geography, topography and meteorology, the final point of which is taken up and expanded on in the following chapter by Jennifer A. Salmond (Auckland) and Ian G. McKendry (British Columbia). This second chapter discusses the local, urban and regional-scale atmospheric processes that affect pollutant transport and dispersal, the complex feedback mechanisms that make street-level concentrations difficult to predict, and the potential of informed urban design to reduce pollutant build-up.
In the third chapter, William Bloss (Birmingham) focuses on these complex chemical processes in the urban atmosphere, specifically the short-timescale reactions arising from traffic emissions and uncertainties in the current scientific understanding.
While the majority of urban air-quality problems result from road traffic, higher concentrations of some pollutants may also be experienced by underground commuters around the world, with unknown health implications, according to Imre Salma’s (University of Eotvos) report in Chapter four.
Unregulated indoor exposure to air pollutants may be a dominant contributor to human health insults. In the fifth chapter, Sotiris Vardoulakis (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) provides a review of personal exposure assessment techniques which, he argues, should complement ambient air quality limit values, exposure reduction objectives and vehicle emissions and other standards in targeting air pollution in indoor and outdoor environments.
Robert L. Maynard (HPA) updates us, in the penultimate chapter, on the current research into the health effects of specific pollutants: particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, ozone, carbon monoxide and carcinogens, such as benzene, 1,3-butadiene, PAHs and arsenic. Key findings suggest that, contrary to the message conveyed by the setting of air quality objectives, there is no threshold of effect for many common pollutants; that long-term exposure to particulate matter leads primarily to cardiovascular, rather than respiratory, disease; and that ultrafine, or nanoparticles, may be the most toxicologically active (though the epidemiology on this is not clear).
The final chapter from Martin Williams (Defra) provides a historical perspective on UK air-quality policy development over the last 50 years. He discusses the role of the policy-maker in interpreting the science and in determining acceptable risk, evaluates the effectiveness of national instruments, hints at the limitations of the current system of air quality management based on achieving objective concentrations and advocates combination with the exposure-reduction approach to more equitably and cost-effectively protect public health, challenging air quality managers and policy-makers to ‘think creatively’ to achieve this goal. Finally, Williams examines the synergistic opportunities for tackling air quality and climate change as the focus for strategic urban policy development in the near future.
As a very broad overview of a complex subject, I would concur with the editors’ recommendation of this book to air-quality practitioners in central and local government, consultancies and industry, environmentalists, policy-makers and students of environmental science, engineering and management courses. The book could equally inform interested non-experts, arguably the most valuable target audience to initiate changes necessary for improvements in air quality.
Caveat: the views presented here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the University of the West of England.
Air Quality in Urban Environments
Issues in Environmental Science and Technology
Editors: R. M. Harrison and R. E. Hester,
The Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, UK, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-84755-907-4, http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/9781847559654
(Hardback); pp xii + 162; £54.95
