This comparison will be between Finland
and Republic of Moldova. Finland is the peninsular country I will look into
this week and also the more developed country between these two.
In Europe, Finland is known as one of the most
“green” countries and this is why here, the concentration of air pollutants is
lower in Finland and there are only a few cases when the values from this
country rush up to the roof. However, there is an important amount of O3 and PM
10 in the atmosphere especially in the urban areas. So, the O3 concentration
could occur during the wintertime conditions because of the domestic heating
and the increase on PM 10 is the result of the springtime dust periods as are
they known in the region. Also, we must not ignore the transboundary pollution
which is an important fact in whole Europe. What should be a concern is that in
these springtime events, the daily values for PM10 are sometimes higher than
the EU limit, so a long exposure of the population could cause some health
issue. All the information regarding Finland’s air quality come from the Finnish Meteorological Institute, where real time air quality maps can be
found.
Even though is a green country, Finland has its
issues and NOX is one of those chapters where there are some problems similarly
to other developed EU members. In certain street canyons in downtown Helsinki
with the highest traffic volumes, the annual limit value may be exceeded.
Despite being a developed
country, Finland has a particular behaviour for all that means energy and
transport. Because its population has adopted a less aggressive approach in the
transport and energy areas, the pollution that results from these two
activities has nothing to do with GHG, but the result is in other kind of
pollution.
An
interesting document is the Informative Inventory Report , report which summarizes the evolution of
pollution between 1990 and 2007 and makes some projections about how the
emissions values for NOX, NH3,
NMVOC, SOX , PM10 AND PM2.5 will evolve in 2020 and 2050.
According
to Statistic Finland, at the end of 2012 Finland will be able to reach
the value of emissions from 1990, target which has been set by the Kyoto
Protocol.
A widely accepted idea is that in
future the PM values will become a higher concern than the classic gases
emissions.
On the other hand, Republic of Moldova
must deal with some serious problems. For
this country, the most important resources are the soil and the climate but
these are in danger to disappear as a result of climate change. Without a real
active industry and major cities, Rep. of Moldova is a “victim” transboundary pollution.
The economy of this country is actually based on agriculture and every shift
and change in climate is felt in productivity and of course in GDP.
According to the Moldavian StateHydrometeorological Service there
were recorded 9 droughts between 1990 and 2007. In addition, in 2007 was
recorded the most severe drought which affected over three quarters of the
Moldavian territory, drought that of course had serious consequence in economy
as well.
IPCC’s 4th
report was used as well for projections for Rep. of Moldova and according to National Human Development Reportfor 2009-2010 , Climate Change in Moldova, and the table underneath shows how
precipitation and temperature will vary for A2 an B2 scenarios.
So, the Ministry of Environment is
quite involved and has under its order the SHS, the State Hydrometeorological
Service with 17 holding quality monitoring stations.
The
Ministry of the Environment (MoE) plays a key role in environmental
observations and data collection whereas the main network of environmental
quality monitoring stations is maintained generally by the State
Hydrometeorological Service (SHS).
The air
pollution in this country has as major sources in the urban areas the traffic
and the construction industry, and in the rural areas the important sources are
central heating, bakeries and wineries because Rep. of Moldova has large areas
covered by vineyards, due the soil and temperatures.
As in all
Europe, the transboundary air pollution manifests through acid rainfall, the
result of SO2 AND NO2 emissions, emissions that come from thermal power
stations, large industrial enterprises, burning coal and other fossil fuels and
of course transport.
- the emissions from the chemical factories that contaminate both the air because of the non-updated filters and soil dues the infiltration;
- waste burning factories;
- chemical treatment of the agricultural crops and forest areas against diseases and pests.
This video shows one of the pollution sources from Bic. I apologize that is no English translation but I believe that the images speak for theirself.
Source: Youtube
In 1992, Rep of Moldova signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and in 2003 the Kyoto Protocol and the Capacity Building for Improving the Quality of Greenhouse Gas Inventories, Europe/CIS region.
The latest documents about climate change mitigations that this country recognizes are “Financing Energy Efficiency Investments for Climate Change Mitigation” 2008–2012 and Moldova Energy Conservation and Greenhouse Gases Emission Reduction” 2006–2016.
Moreover, David Maddisona and Katrin Rehdanzb conclude in their article from Ecological Economics, that in 1996, Rep. Moldova was the least satisfied country.
No comments:
Post a Comment