MADRID, 27 (SERVIMEDIA)
Only fifteen municipalities in Spain have effective instruments against air pollution, and none are adapted to the state Framework Protocol approved in 2021, as denounced this Friday by the Confederation of Ecologists in Action.
In addition, he criticized that “to date only fifteen urban areas have been provided with protocols for action against episodes of poor air quality.” And all this, as they explained, despite the fact that in 2007 the state law on air quality and protection of the atmosphere forced its adoption “in all agglomerations and municipalities with a population of more than 100,000 inhabitants, which is currently sixty-four”.
These municipalities are the Asturian cities of Avilés, Gijón and Oviedo (through an autonomous protocol) and the municipalities of A Coruña, Barcelona, Gijón, León, Madrid, Murcia, Seville, Valencia, Valladolid and Zaragoza, as well as the main towns in the metropolitan areas of Barcelona and Madrid, applying regional protocols.
However, Ecologists in Action denounced that “cities as relevant” as Alicante, Bilbao, Cartagena, Córdoba, Elche, Granada, Málaga, Palma, Las Palmas, Pamplona, Santa Cruz, Vigo or Vitoria do not have protocols against pollution episodes , “despite the fact that the Government and autonomous communities approved in July 2021 the Short-term Action Framework Plan for episodes of air pollution.”
FEW AND DISPARATE
In addition, they highlighted that the few protocols against episodes of poor air quality in force to date “are very different”, both in the pollutants considered (in general particles and/or nitrogen dioxide) and in the thresholds for the application of the various measures and their scope.
From the institution they added that these consistories should incorporate “immediate and extensive restrictions on the movement of cars or the point sources responsible for the episodes, in each case.”
Air pollution is responsible in Spain for more than 10,000 premature deaths each year, according to recent studies by the Carlos III Health Institute and the Ministry of Health. It has a very significant short-term impact on health, “which six-folds the mortality from traffic accidents,” as the entity recalled.
ROYAL DECREE
For this reason, the publication last Tuesday, January 24, of a Royal Decree that reiterates the obligation of these instruments in all autonomous communities and in town halls with more than 100,000 inhabitants where there is a risk of suffering episodes of poor air quality, “It is a positive initiative, although it does not establish a maximum approval period”, according to the entity, except for the adaptation of the current protocols or in preparation to the State Action Framework Plan.
Said Royal Decree, which modifies the air quality improvement regulation, “establishes minimum activation, information and alert thresholds for the main atmospheric pollutants”, among which alert thresholds appear for the first time for the most dangerous pollutants, the particles.
“However, these thresholds are higher than those set by the World Health Organization (WHO), so they are insufficient,” warned the Confederation of Ecologists in Action.
He added that “given that most of the pollution in urban areas comes from traffic, and mostly from cars, a good part of the measures to reduce pollution spikes should be aimed at limiting the use of the car sufficiently in advance, through actions that at the same time reduce speed and the use of the car”.
Finally, in Spain, pollution episodes are related to situations of stable, dry and windless anticyclonic weather, with winter thermal inversions and summer heat waves being the most propitious meteorological phenomena for pollutants to rise.
(SERVIMEDIA) 27-JAN-2023 11:37 (GMT +1) CAG/gja
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