Journal
PROCESS SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
Volume 146, Issue -, Pages 952-960Publisher
ELSEVIER
DOI: 10.1016/j.psep.2020.12.029
Keywords
Urban environment; Nitrogen dioxide; Road traffic emissions; Traffic emissions; SARS-CoV-2; Low emission zones
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The study compared air quality data during lockdown in London, Milan, and Paris, finding a significant decrease in NO2 concentrations due to reduced traffic. Despite the decrease in traffic contributions, high NO2 concentrations were still recorded in some locations. To reduce pollution effectively, a vision focusing on both traffic reduction and rethinking vehicle pollution effects is necessary.
Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) can have harmful effects on human health and can act as a precursor for the formation of other air pollutants in urban environment such as secondary PM2.5 and ozone. The lockdown measures for CoViD-19 allowed to simulate on a large scale the massive and prolonged reduction of road traffic (the main source for NO2 in urban environment). This work aims to selectively assess the maximum impact that total traffic blocking measures can have on NO2. For this reason, three megacities (London, Milan and Paris) were chosen which had similar characteristics in terms of climatic conditions, population, policies of urban traffic management and lockdown measures. 52 air quality control units have been used to compare data measured in lockdown and in the same periods of previous years, highlighting a significant decrease in NO2 concentration due to traffic (London: 71.1 % - 80.8 %; Milan: 8.6 % - 42.4 %; Paris: 65.7 % - 79.8 %). In 2020 the contribution of traffic in London, Milan and Paris dropped to 3.3 +/- 1.3 mu g m(-3), 6.1 +/- 0.8 mu g m(-3), and 13.4 +/- 1.5 mu g m(-3), respectively. Despite the significant reduction in the NO2 concentration, in UT stations average NO2 concentrations higher than 40 mu g m(-3) were registered for several days. In order to reduce the pollution, the limitation of road traffic could be not enough, but a vision also aimed at rethink the vehicles and their polluting effects should be developed. (C) 2020 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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