Studies Show Local Asthma Pollution Threat Worse than Monitored

12.00.00am GMT Tue 10th Dec 2002

A local study shows that pollution of the air on the borough's streets may be much worse than is being measured by the standard monitoring equipment.

It shows that if measurements are taken at head height the levels of pollution for substances associated with asthma (NO, NO2, NOx,) are at least 15% higher than captured in the official (3 meter) devices: unsurprising as the pollutants are heavy and sink to the ground.

These results will confirm the legitimacy of the anxiety of local parents in schools where 10% of children use nebulisers to help them breathe.

MP Vincent Cable said he had sent the study to the Environment Minister, Michael Meacher, asking him to follow it up urgently at a national level:

"despite the rhetoric of Richmond being a 'green' borough the air is very polluted by national standards mainly because of very heavy car and aircraft use."

"The link to respiratory diseases is now very clearly made. What is worrying about this study is that the problem may be even worse than we imagined because monitoring equipment is collecting samples at the wrong height."

"If so there could be some radical and perhaps unpalatable implications for transport policy in the borough".

Contact Brian Holder, 99 Queens Road, Teddington