Imagine a world without aircraft pollution. Imagine a world without bus, taxi, motorbike and car fumes. We didn't quite get to the promised land yesterday, but the "snow event" that paralysed many parts of the UK did force much of this traffic off of our roads and out of our skies and in London the resulting reduction in emission levels has already been noted by the scientists at King's College London, who manage the London Air Quality Network (LAQN).
One of the most polluted monitoring sites in London on any "normal" day is to be found at the corner of Marylebone Road and Baker Street. The readings for this time last week, which the LAQN team have told me represent a typical weekday reading for this time of year, are as follows:
Nitrogen Dioxide – 110 parts per billion
PM10 particulates – 85 micrograms per cubic metre
Yesterday's readings, however, show a marked reduction:
Nitrogen Dioxide – 15 parts per billion
PM10 particulates – 22 micrograms per cubic metre
The LAQN team said yesterday's readings are much lower than the readings they would expect even on a Sunday. It's something of a sweet irony, then, that London should experience such low emissions on the very day that Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, announced he was suspending the third phase of the city's low emission zone, because it would have a "detrimental impact" on small businesses during the economic downturn.
I guess this means we'll have to wait another day for a time when concentrating on the detrimental impact that air pollution has on our collective health and the wider environment takes priority over base economic needs. Don't hold your breath, though.
