See China’s air pollution in real time 

Posted on September 7, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

Researchers at Berkeley have used Google Maps and new data on China’s air pollution to create a near real-time visualization of the country’s air quality. The online map is based on findings that the scientists published last month in the journal PLoS One.

The study is based on hourly air quality measurements from 1,500 sites across China and Hong Kong over a four month period last year. During that period (April to August 2014), 92 percent of China’s population experienced more than 120 hours of “unhealthy air,” based on US standards, while 38 percent were exposed to average concentrations that were unhealthy. Authors Robert Rohde and Richard Muller, of the research organization Berkeley Earth, calculated that outdoor air pollution contributes to 1.6 million deaths in China every year, or 4,400 per day.

As the South China Morning Post reports, Rohde and Muller have now applied their methodology to develop a Google Maps plug-in that displays air pollution levels across China in near real-time. The map shows levels of air particulates measuring less than 2.5 microns in diameter (PM2.5), which are considered to be most dangerous to human health. Levels are displayed along a colored gradient, like a weather radar map, with low levels in green and unhealthy levels in red. Orange areas signify pollution levels that are dangerous to sensitive populations. On Thursday morning, the highest smog levels were in Shanghai, along China’s eastern coast, and near the northeastern province of Shandong.

The Chinese government has taken steps to mitigate the country’s air pollution, in response to public outcry, though it has retained tight control over public data and media reports. When a documentary on China’s smog crisis went viral earlier this year, government censors quickly blocked access to it.

Source: See China’s air pollution in real time | The Verge

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Urban Air Pollution No Worse in Israel Than in Europe, Ministry Says 

Posted on September 4, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

The high level of air pollution in Israeli cities is caused mainly by motor vehicles, but the air quality isn’t any worse than in large cities in Europe and Canada, according to a report by the Environmental Protection Ministry.

Air pollution in Israel has decreased in recent years, according to the report for 2014, the first of its kind in Israel.

In some metropolitan areas there are especially high concentrations of two pollutants produced by fuel combustion in both transportation and industry — volatile organic compounds and nitrogen dioxide in city centers emitted by vehicles.

These pollutants cause breathing problems and higher disease rates — even death. Particularly bad pollution has afflicted Jerusalem’s Shmuel Hanavi neighborhood and the city center, as well as the area around Tel Aviv’s old central bus station. Last year 87 excessive nitrogen oxide rates were monitored around the bus station and 116 excessive nitrogen dioxide rates.

Pollution exceeding the permitted amount was also found on Haifa’s Ha’atzmaut Road, which runs near the port area.

But pollution concentrations have decreased. The sulfur dioxide concentration in Ashdod has fallen nearly 60 percent in the past decade, while the nitrogen dioxide concentration in Bnei Brak near Tel Aviv has fallen by a quarter.

The main reasons are better fuels and harsher standards for emissions by both vehicles and factories. Despite the improvement, in 2014 the concentration of toxic substances at all 14 monitoring points exceeded the permitted level, the ministry said.

The researchers compared pollution concentrations in large Israeli cities with European and Canadian cities including Lisbon, Hamburg, Rotterdam, Warsaw, London, Montreal and Toronto.

It turned out the air quality in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa is similar to that in the foreign cities, but for certain pollutants Haifa’s air is better than in most of the other cities.

Source: Urban Air Pollution No Worse in Israel Than in Europe, Ministry Says – Nature & Environment – Haaretz

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York’s 20 most polluted streets 

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

AIR pollution in many of York’s city centre streets is concerning and regularly exceeds European Union limits, figures have shown.

The City of York Council data revealed the 20 streets with the highest concentrations of nitrogen dioxide – a poisonous gas which can inflame airways and cause other serious health problems.

All of the streets in the top 20 well exceed the annual hourly limit of exposure of 40 microgrammes per metre cubed.

The highest average nitrogen dioxide levels were measured under the York railway station canopy at 65.3m3, followed by Gillygate at 55.2m3, the junction at Micklegate and Bridge Street at 54.7m3, Rougier Street at 54.2m3 and Bootham (pictured below) at 52.3m3.

The cause of high nitrogen dioxide concentrations are traffic omissions, primarily from diesel vehicles such as buses, experts have said.

Dr James Lee, an atmospheric chemist working at the University of York’s Wolfson Atmospheric Chemistry Laboratories, said: “At very high levels nitrogen dioxide inflames airways and can cause things like asthma. In the long term, if you are exposed to levels above 40m3 for the whole year it can affect your lung function and could decrease life expectancy. Promoted stories Recommended by

“York’s streets are very narrow, the pollution can be trapped in by the buildings.”

Dr Lee said the key to reducing levels would be to have fewer vehicles on the streets and vehicles with lower emissions.

Other highly polluted streets according to the readings from last year include Blossom Street (pictured below), George Hudson Street, Holgate Road, Lawrence Street, Barbican Road and Paragon Street.

The challenge of tackling air pollution is “one of the city’s greatest challenges”, Cllr Andrew Waller, executive member for environmental services at York said.

He said: “York is at the forefront of reducing emissions through the introduction of innovative measures to help reduce emissions. These include introducing electric buses, taxis and electric charging points. I am reviewing these and other measures in York’s third Air Quality Action Plan, which will be taken to a decision session for approval in November. The key issue is to respond to the challenge with a clear plan, based on scientific assessment, and which is fully explained to the public.”

He said the council has also introduced a Low Emission Strategy which was introduced in 2012 and other measures including converting buses.

Cllr Andy D’Agorne, leader of the Green Party, said: “There’s no one magic bullet solution but it’s a scandal that individual health is being sacrificed for lack of decisive action. As a minimum, station taxis and buses at Rougier St should be switching off their engines while waiting in such pollution blackspots. Other UK cities have on the spot fines for offenders eg Edinburgh but the only action in York has been the promotion of more low emission vehicles – that is good but not enough.”

City of York Council has a legal duty to to address poor air quality however the road running under the canopy is the responsibility of the station which is run by Network Rail and Virgin Trains East Coast.

A spokesperson for Virgin Trains East Coast said: “The station is in an area of the city which deals with a substantial volume of road traffic and congestion each day. We are supporting the City of York Council’s Local Transport Plan to improve air quality and enhance access to the station for emission-free cycling and walking. For example, we’ve invested in 400 new secure cycle spaces at the station, but we have also instruct taxis drivers to switch off their engines while under the station portico.”

Nitrogen dioxide is one of the key air pollutants in York to be measured by the Public Protection Team for City of York Council. The council said it also measures particulates, the levels of which meet objectives in York.

Areas with highest levels of pollution (including nitrogen dioxide average reading)

1. Under York Railway Station Canopy 65.3

2. Gillygate 55.2

3. Bridge St / Micklegate junction 54.7

4. Rougier Street (Roadside near junction with Tanner Moat) 54.2

5. Bootham 52.3

6. Blossom Street 52.2

7. George Hudson Street 52.0

8. Holgate Road 51.3

9. Rougier Street (bus stop outside Society) 49.2

10. Lawrence Street 48.4

11. Barbican Road 48.3

12. Paragon Street 47.9

13. Coppergate 47.0

14. Nessgate / Clifford Street junction 46.1

15. Fishergate 45.2

16. The Mount 44.3

17. St Leonards Place 43.9

18. Prices Lane 43.3 Share article

19. The Stonebow 42.9

20. Lord Mayors Walk 42.6

Source: York’s 20 most polluted streets (From York Press)

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City Hall introduces new air quality standards for London construction site equipment 

Posted on September 2, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

London construction sites will be required to update or replace some of their most polluting equipment, after the introduction of new standards aimed at improving the capital’s air quality.

City Hall yesterday implemented a Low Emission Zone for construction machinery in central London, requiring non-road mobile machinery (NRMM) with net power between 37kW and 560kW and over the age of 10 years to be replaced or retrofitted with emission reduction technologies.

The NRMM regulation also extends to sites building more than 10 homes or measuring more than 1,000 square feet across the entirety of the Greater London area.

Construction companies must meet the new standards within six months or they will be faced with time or financial penalties for their projects, the regulation’s guidance notes say.

Matthew Pencharz, deputy mayor for environment and energy, said the new standards were important to address poor air quality in London.

“Dust and fumes from construction sites are a nuisance to people who live close by but they also impact on London’s wider air quality,” he said. “That’s why it’s so important for these new emission standards to come in to address the problem, which together with our efforts on transport emissions will make a significant difference to the air Londoners breathe.”

The authority estimates up to 12 per cent of nitrogen oxide and 15 per cent of particulate pollution in the capital is emitted by construction and demolition activity, but argues the new regulations could see these levels plummet by nearly 50 per cent by 2020.

The new standards are designed to complement the Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) for vehicles which will be introduced in central London in 2020, charging the most polluting diesel vehicles an additional £12.50 a day on top of the Congestion Charge.

Source: City Hall introduces new air quality standards for London construction site equipment – 02 Sep 2015 – News from BusinessGreen

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Air and noise pollution has severe consequences on heart health

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD), including heart disease and stroke, are the no 1 killer worldwide and in Europe, where they cause the death of over 10 000 people daily, i.e. more than all cancers combined.

Recent scientific evidence shows that air and noise pollution are environmental health risks which have severe consequences on heart health.

CVD account for 80% of all premature deaths due to air pollution. The effects may be so serious that experts advise heart disease patients to stay inside during rush hour traffic. In the UK, the government will have to submit air quality plans to the European Commission by the end of 2015. The ruling came after the government failed to comply with European limits on nitrogen dioxide set to protect health and outlined in the European Union (EU) Air Quality Directive (6). The European Commission also took Belgium and Bulgaria to court over poor air quality and Sweden was given a final warning.

Noise pollution increases the risk of CVD, including hypertension and heart disease. In Europe, it is estimated to contribute to at least 10 000 premature deaths due to heart disease and stroke each year.

Public policies can do much to protect health and, ultimately, to reduce the burden of CVD in Europe.

Tomorrow the European Society of Cardiology (ESC), together with the European Association for Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation (EACPR) and the European Heart Network (EHN), will be officially launching the ‘Environment & the Heart Campaign’ to raise awareness about the need to create healthy environments for the protection of heart health and to encourage policymakers’ action.

Healthcare professionals, patient advocates, policymakers and the wider public are invited to join the campaign by signing the online petition on change.org/p/environment-and-the-heart

The campaign is being launched at ESC Congress, the world’s largest and most influential cardiovascular event, set to assemble over 30 000 delegates for five days in London. It is no coincidence that “Environment and the Heart” is the spotlight theme of ESC Congress 2015 and new research will be presented on this increasingly important risk factor.

The outcome of the campaign together with the collected signatures will be presented to European Commissioners for Health, Environment, Climate Change and Transport in Brussels on World Heart Day (29 September), which this year is also focused on creating heart healthy environments.

The campaign comes at a crucial time as Paris prepares to host the UN Climate Change conference from 30 November to 11 December this year, which aims to achieve a new international agreement to keep global warming below 2°C.

Momentum is growing to take action on environmental factors that damage health. Please use your signature to help fight cardiovascular disease.

Source: Air and noise pollution has severe consequences on heart health

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World Pollutionwatch: Fire can kill – far from the flames 

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

Vancouver is normally one of the world’s cleanest cities but this July its air resembled that in Beijing due to smoke and ash from forest fires over 200 kilometres away. Further fires along the western side of the US and Canada have caused numerous health warnings especially at night when smoke settled on valley communities. During August hot weather across southern Europe also led to forest fires in Spain, Portugal and Greece.

Most landscape fires are not truly natural since they occur in areas managed for agriculture or forestry. Although they are generally well away from large cities, the smoke from these fires can travel a long way. Fires in western Russia in 2002 and 2006 led to air pollution problems across Europe as far as the UK. Forest fires across Spain and Portugal added to the health impacts of the 2003 European heatwave and Singapore and Kuala Lumpur experience annual air pollution problems from fires in Indonesia – most notably in 2013.

But these are the fires that feature in the news. Globally around 340,000 deaths per year are thought to be attributable to the additional pollution from landscape fires. This health burden is largest in sub-Saharan Africa and south-east Asia. Landscape fires have greatest impact during El Niño years and least during La Niña, mainly due to differences in weather patterns across south east Asia. Here peat swamps and rainforests rarely burn without human instigation and fires can easily run out of control during dry years.

Ending deforestation by burning would have many benefits, not only for global climate and biodiversity but for human health too.

Source: World Pollutionwatch: Fire can kill – far from the flames | Environment | The Guardian

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Wanted! An army of citizen scientists to tackle air pollution 

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

Turn off Tinder and exit Instagram – scientists want you to turn your iPhones to research. Launching on Tuesday, the iSpex-EU project aims to recruit people from major cities across Europe, including Manchester and London, to take part in an initiative to monitor levels of air pollution.

Run during the International Year of Light, a worldwide celebration of light and light-based technologies this year, the project aims to raise awareness of air pollution and contribute to scientific research by encouraging people to use their mobile phones to record levels of airborne particles and droplets known as atmospheric aerosols.

“The point of the project is to measure the concentration of very fine particles in the atmosphere and these can be from natural sources, things like forest fires or volcanic eruptions, through to manmade factors like burning diesel,” explains Toby Shannon, the UK national co-ordinator of the International Year of Light, who is based at London’s Institute of Physics, one of the organisations supporting the UK side of the iSpex-EU project.

Armed with a free accessory dubbed an “iSpex add-on”, participants will use their iPhones to scan the sky to capture the spectrum of light reaching the device, the angle of the measurement and a property of light known as its polarisation.

“When there are particles in the air, they change the polarisation state of sunlight and that is what we record with iSpex,” says Elise Hendriks, co-ordinator of the iSpex-EU project based at Leiden University in the Netherlands. A free accompanying iPhone app will automatically collect the data and display it on a map, visible both in the app and on a desktop site, together with colour-coded feedback of the aerosol level measured. The data will then be processed and further analysed by the iSpex team.

The initiative follows an initial iSpex project, led by Leiden University, which used a similar set-up to monitor such air-pollution across the Netherlands in 2013. Now the project is going further, looking at atmospheric aerosols in a number of cities across Europe. “Cities are involved generally because there is a higher chance of getting pollution, but also because you need a certain density of people to get good measurements,” explains Dr Hugo Ricketts from the National Centre for Atmospheric Science who is involved in the Manchester arm of the project.

It’s a pressing problem. The Earth’s climate, air traffic and human health are all affected by air pollution. A report from King’s College, London published this summer estimates that in London alone around 9,500 premature deaths a year are linked to high levels of air pollution, of which particulates in the air are a component. Indeed, after smoking “it is the second biggest public health challenge,” says Professor Frank Kelly, an expert in environmental health at the university.

While air pollution is currently monitored using satellite systems as well as ground-based monitoring stations, Kelly believes mobile devices could offer a host of advantages, and is involved in the development of such technologies himself.

“In an ideal world you want to know what the pollution is where you are at that particular point in time and for that you need small, mobile, accessible, cheap instrumentation,” he says. While iSpex is a step in the right direction, Kelly believes that there is room for development.

“It’s good for improving awareness and allowing people to make decisions about how they go from A to B,” he says. “But beyond that it’s not that useful as it doesn’t tell you exactly what you are being exposed to.”

But others believe the data collected by citizen scientists will complement current techniques and could lead to new insights and aid mapping. “What we are hoping to get out of this project is enough distribution [of measurements] over Manchester that you should be able to start seeing whether there is a particular area that is more affected by pollution or less affected by pollution,” says Ricketts.

The iSpex units can be requested by email from co-ordinators within participating cities. Contact details are available at ispex-eu.org. “We’re hoping to get 750 citizen scientists in London and then a similar number in Manchester,” says Shannon. And with the campaign running until 15 October, he’s hoping for an Indian summer. “You need a nice clear blue sky to take the measurements,” he says as he looks over rainswept London. “I’m hoping it is not going to be like this for six weeks.”

Source: Wanted! An army of citizen scientists to tackle air pollution | Environment | The Guardian

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Respro® Masks FAQ: Do I need to replace the valves?

Posted on August 28, 2015 by Respro® UK Ltd

DO I NEED TO REPLACE THE VALVES?

The valves should not need replacing on a regular basis assuming that they are maintained properly. On a monthly basis, it is advisable to flush the valves through with warm water, allow to dry and apply a little talcum powder to prevent the valve from sticking. On the Powa valve, it is essential that you locate the two pins, nearest the hinge, properly into the body of the valve, and check that they are seated properly.

For more Frequently Asked Questions,  go to Respro® Mask FAQ

All Respro® products are available from our website respro.com

Respro® will ship your order to anywhere on the planet free of charge.

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