The level of air pollution in London has reached the legal limit for the whole of 2018 less than one month into the year. This is actually a significant improvement on previous years, as for the last decade air pollution has reached illegal levels no later than six days into the year. Modern air pollution records for London began 18 years ago, and this is the first time that London has gone almost a month before reaching the legal limit.
Improvements are partly due to the actions of the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, who has introduced cleaner buses on routes in pollution blackspots and charges to deter certain vehicles from central London. However, Government policies and inaction have prevented further improvements. Clean air plans gave already been declared illegal at the High Court twice for failing to cut air pollution in the shortest time possible, a requirement under EU law.
The Government's own analysis has shown that charging zones to deter dirty cars from urban centres are the most effective policy, but ministers have told councils that they should be a last resort. The Government's latest plan, produced in July, was condemned as woefully inadequate by city leaders and inexcusable by doctors.
Environment minister Thérèse Coffey told Parliament last Thursday: "The government will continue to improve air quality, supported by the new comprehensive clean air strategy that we are developing and will publish later this year. We have already put in place a £3.5bn plan to improve air quality, with a particular focus on transport."
The law requires that the hourly measurement of toxic nitrogen dioxide must not exceed 200 micrograms per cubic metre more than 18 times a year. Brixton Road has now recorded 18 breaches, and is expected to break the limit within the next few days. In the past, the most polluted places have vastly exceeded this limit. In 2016 Putney High Street broke the hourly limit more than 1,200 times.
Toxic air has been at illegal levels in London and in most urban areas of the UK since 2010, resulting in around 40,000 early deaths per year. Particulate pollution is also a serious health hazard. While levels are generally within legal limits, research in October showed that every person in London is breathing air that exceeds World Health Organisation guidelines.
