This week
comparison will be between Malta and Switzerland – two completely different
countries both in mentality and development.
The
island and less developed country is Malta and it has to deal with some serious
issues in the area of air quality and quality control. Issues regarding air
quality can be spilt in two major parts: the amount of pollution that comes
from agriculture and traffic (the anthropogenic input) and the sea salt and
dust from Sahara (the natural input). Even though the agriculture sector is not
important in this country’s economy, in the rural areas where the farming is
sometimes the only income the air pollution reaches the level of danger.
Moreover, farming influences landscape quality, biodiversity and soil and water
quality. However, the transboundary pollution that affects the Mediterranean
space must not be ignored. This is why the Global Air Pollution Crossroads over
the Mediterranean article by Lelieveld et. all. shows how the
transboundary pollution for CO2 is spilt in: western Europe pollution from
France, Germany and Italy and eastern pollution from Poland, Ukraine and
Russia; so basically the major concern in Malta is air quality. Like in other
countries that have not a really important pollutant industry, in Malta the
traffic is responsible for exceeding the CO2 , PM10 and 2.5 ,O3 , C6H6, NO2 and SO2 emissions. The
PM 10 and 2.5 issues is one of the environmental problems that has serious
impact on humans’ health by a decrease in lung function, general ill, asthma
and in some cases even death.
Source: http://www.mepa.org.mt/ter08-air
According to Malta Environment
& Planning Authority, the EU standard set limit values for O3, the 120μg/m³
8-hourly running average value for human health protection is not to be
exceeded more than 25 times per year (6.8% of days measured); and also the 180μg/m³
hourly information threshold for human health protection. However, the map above
shows that especially in the northern part, Malta is dealing with O3
concentration levels > 100 μg/m³, concentrations that are most likely to be
around or above EU MPC. Along with PM 10 and 2.5 pollution, the O3 pollution
has the same transboundary origin.
An
interesting fact is that because of its small size the amount of pollution is
very low compared to other countries from Europe and this is illustrated by how
climate change could affect Malta due its position.
So what should be done? Firstly, it is important
to highlight that Maltese Government has adopted some measures to prevent the
negative effects of pollution by drawing up some projects. In my opinion the
most important are: Malta’s Air QualityPlan and the National Allocation Plan for Malta 2008 – 2012 .
Some of the other measures proposed by the Government are restriction in
importation of cars that are more polluting, reduction of conventional energy
use and an increase in usage of alternative technologies. Proposals were issued
by Government in 2008, and implementation begun in 2010. Other measures can be
find here.
In contrast, Switzerland
is a more developed country and has more influence in the European
international context. The environmental problems are mostly the ones that are
common in all countries: air pollution, water pollution, land use etc. , and
each one of them affects the population’s heath as well.
It is known that air pollution causes respiratory and
cardiovascular diseases and also premature deaths and has a major impact on
vegetation.
According to the EEA country report,
Switzerland’s air quality has improved in the last 25 years and that means
reductions in Pm 10 and 2.5, NOx, NMVOC, NH3 and CO2 emissions. This is
obviously the result of using new technologies that emit fewer pollutants and a
result of this decrease will be a decrease in premature mortality from particulate matter and of course the diseases
that can occur after exposure to this kind of pollution. Is expected that
should the current measures be carried on in the future, the number of
exceedances will drop until 2020.
Some of the international agreements that are
signed by Switzerland are: The Arctic Treaty , The Kyoto Protocol, UNECE Geneva Convention onLong-range Transboundary Air Pollution and the national law about air quality are: Federal Act on the Protection of the Environment or Ordinance on air protection.
If in the past the Fheon
phenomenon was quite a delicate problem for Switzerland, now
climate change, acid rain and pollution in general are the real issues in
this country. Basically one of the obvious impacts is the glaciers retreat in
Alps, where there are more than 3000 km² of glaciers that are quickly melting. On the Swiss glacier monitoring network there are maps and lists that can be analyzed
and the speed of the retreat and which one of the glaciers are melting faster
than the others can be calculated.
I hope that this video will illustrate better
how serious and current is the retreat of glaciers:
Furthermore, on the FederalOffice of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss there are reports that
show that during the last 50 years it was recorded an increase of 1.8°C in the
Switzerland’s mean temperature and an increase in the frequency of heavy
precipitation events in all seasons. Besides this, some projections indicate
that is more likely for the summer heat waves and droughts to become longer and
more frequent.