Pollutionwatch

By the start of last month it was being widely reported that 2008 was likely to be the coldest year so far this century. December continued the trend, and was the coldest December since 1996. Despite some suggestions that this disproves global warming, current best estimates are still putting 2008 in the top 10 hottest years on record.

One effect of this warmer weather has been to reduce the number of significant winter air pollution episodes in the UK. The cold weather last month had a significant impact on pollution levels and government targets were broken on 20 days for particle pollution, and on 22 days for nitrogen dioxide.

Problems with high hourly concentrations of nitrogen dioxide are usually limited to a small number of monitoring sites, and particularly Marylebone Road in London. Last month eight monitoring sites recorded concentrations above the government recommended level; the most frequent problems were in Salford and Bury, near Manchester.

Marylebone Road was the worst site in terms of particle pollution with concentrations exceeding government objectives on 14 days. In the early part of the month, targets for particles were also broken in Camden, north London; Bristol; Glasgow; Belfast and Derry. Concentrations fluctuated throughout the month until the 29th when concentrations across the country began to suddenly rise until on the 30th and 31st over a dozen sites across the UK broke the limits.

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