Major cities blighted by nitrogen dioxide pollution, research finds
Cities in relatively prosperous countries are blighted by serious levels of air pollution from nitrogen dioxide, often without realising the extent of the problem, research has found.
Moscow is the world’s second worst city for nitrogen dioxide pollution, behind Shanghai in China, while St Petersburg takes fourth place. Other cities near Russia follow close behind, including Ashgabat, capital of Turkmenistan, and Minsk, capital of Belarus, at seventh and eighth place respectively, according to the research, published on Wednesday.
Pallavi Pant, senior scientist at the Health Effects Institute in the US, who oversaw the research, said: “Finding several Russian cities at the top of the list [for NO2 air pollution] was definitely surprising for us. It is likely to mainly come from traffic pollution and a vehicle fleet that is older.”
Other cities worst affected by NO2 pollution included Tehran in Iran, Cairo in Egypt, Istanbul in Turkey and Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.
While the problem of particulate pollution – caused by very fine pieces of soot or debris, mostly from burning and some industrial sources – has been an increasing cause of concern around the world, the problem of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) pollution has been less well studied, with limited on-the-ground monitoring stations capable of detecting the gas.
Scientists from the Health Effects Institute in the US used satellite data, along with on-the-ground read-outs, to compile a global picture of fine particulate (PM2.5) and NO2 air pollution in more than 7,000 cities globally, for the State of the Global Air report.
They found that while poorer countries tended to be plagued by pollution from particulates – very fine pieces of unburnt carbon or debris, mostly from
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