Speaker
Description
Air pollution in Brasov city is a subject of high interest for authorities and researchers due to its impact on human activities as well as due to the specific conditions found in this region – from geographical conditions affecting the pollutant dispersion to the sustained high air pollution levels. Of particular concern were the infringement procedures from the European Commission against Romania for not assuring a proper level of air quality for the population – in particular with respect to PM10 and NO2 pollutants - not only in Brasov, but also in other major cities (e.g., Bucharest, Iasi) (Iorga, 2021), especially during the period 2007-2020. Among the response measures, the City Hall in collaboration with community-based UradMonitor network (www.uradmonitor.com) (Velea et al, 2023) started to provide, from 2022, a real-time information service to citizen on air quality status. The present analysis investigates the added-value of these measurements in assessing the air pollution level at yearly and monthly scale, as well as with respect to high-pollution events. To this end, community-based PM10 and PM2.5 measurements, covering the period 2022-2023, are used to build three indicators recommended by the European Environment Agency (EEA), namely the annual mean (P1Y), monthly mean (P1M) and 3-consecutive days exceeding concentration thresholds (P1Y-3daysAbove). Data from the national monitoring network (www.calitateaer.ro) is used as reference. The results highlight the increased capability of higher-density community-based network to characterize the spatial distribution of pollution level within the city and to identify high-pollution events. These features open opportunities for a spatially detailed characterization of air pollution hazard, which, combined with socio-economic data, may provide the basis for an air-pollution risk assessment. Preliminary results of this approach are also presented.
The results are partly obtained in the project Climate-Resilient Development Pathways in Metropolitan Regions of Europe (CARMINE), funded by the Εuropean Union under the Horizon Europe Programme (Grant agreement 101137851).
Keywords: air pollution, PM10, PM2.5, hazard, risk assessment, Brasov city
References
Velea, L., Udriștioiu, M.T., Puiu, S., Motișan, R., Amarie, D. (2023): A Community-Based Sensor Network for Monitoring the Air Quality in Urban Romania. Atmosphere, 14, 840. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14050840 (Q3)
Iorga, G. (2021). Air Pollution and Environmental Policies, EU and Romania: Where We Stand, What the Data Reveals, What Should Be Done in the Future?. In: Todor, A., Helepciuc, F.E. (eds) Europeanization of Environmental Policies and their Limitations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68586-7_4
