LONGITUDINAL ASSESSMENT OF AIR POLLUTANTS IN LISBON REGION BETWEEN 2014-2018 AT ENTRECAMPOS AND LARANJEIRAS STATIONS

Authors

  • Susana Paixão Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra, Coimbra Health School, Environmental Health Department
  • Carolina Teixeira Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra, Coimbra Health School, Environmental Health Department
  • João Paulo Figueiredo Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra, Coimbra Health School, Environmental Health Department
  • Ana Ferreira Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra, Coimbra Health School, Environmental Health Department

Keywords:

Air pollutants, Climate change, Monitoring networks, Public health

Abstract

Background: Climate change is one of the main threats to sustainable development. Climate plays an important role in determining air quality standards at various scales, in time and space since emissions are influenced by meteorological variables such as temperature, humidity, speed, and wind direction. Emissions from road traffic come from the combustion process, with the consequent release of exhaust gases. Air pollution in many countries is getting worse with industrialization and urbanization. Climate change can directly or indirectly affect the incidence and severity of respiratory infections. The existence of different types of stations operating in the same network of monitoring of the air quality (RMQAr) allows an evaluation at different scales, thus facilitating the evaluation of air quality and its management.

Aim: This study aimed to evaluate the behavior of the variation of the concentrations of five pollutants:  nitrogen dioxide (NO2), nitrogen oxide (NOx), ozone (O3), particulate matter less than 2, 5 (PM2,5), and particulate matter less than 10 (PM10), from the year 2014 to 2018 in two different air quality stations, Entrecampos, an urban station where its type of influence is car traffic and that of Laranjeiro, an urban station and its type of influence is the background.

Methods:  This work is based on air quality data extracted from the QualAR Online Database of the Portuguese Environment Agency.

Results: In this work, we observed that the concentration of NO2, NOx, PM2.5, and PM10 is always higher in the air quality station of Entrecampos (EQAE) and the opposite happens with the O3 in the air quality station in Laranjeiro (EQAL). It was found that there is great variability in the concentration of these pollutants throughout the seasons and days since they are influenced by weather conditions and natural and anthropogenic sources.

Conclusion(s): Systematically monitoring the concentrations of pollutants over time allows us to obtain important information about their location and geographical and spatial dispersion that can be used to study possible risk sites, to minimize emission sources, or adapt solutions to reduce their values.

 

Presenter e-mail: supaixao@estescoimbra.pt

Published

2021-04-21

Issue

2021: IFEH 4th World Academic Conference on Environmental Health - Book of Abstracts

Section

Presentations