Eco

lifestyle Eco

STOP BURNING, SAVE LIVES

by STEVE SANGSTER

I developed an interest in air quality last year when my neighbour showed me his network of monitors he had set up in Orpington and further afield. With three young children I was concerned about the impacts of pollution on their health and began my own monitoring to complement his studies and build up an ongoing picture of the air quality in Orpington.

It has been fascinating to study the changes in air quality and how local and worldwide events can impact the air that we breathe. In particular, the lockdown due to Coronavirus has been an opportunity for us to review the impacts of significantly reducing vehicle and industry emissions.

What has been most disappointing from my air quality studies is that Orpington seems to have missed out on the reduction in pollution seen in other areas during the ‘lockdown’. It has been widely reported that many areas in London and elsewhere in the UK have seen significant reductions in Nitrogen Dioxide (No2) as traffic levels have fallen. However, in Orpington my No2 monitoring tubes have shown only a modest 3.5% reduction between February and April despite traffic levels falling by at least a half in that period. One of the main contributing factors I believe has been the number of garden bonfires seen during this period.

With waste centres closed and people spending more time in their gardens, for some residents the easiest answer to removing the green waste accumulated has been to burn it. What people may not realise, and I certainly didn't until I started my monitoring was the considerable impact a bonfire can have on the air quality,

not just for the neighbours in the immediate vicinity, but for miles around.

This issue particularly hit home when we saw the increase in toxic fine particulate matter (PM2.5) - one of the most dangerous by-products of burning wood or green waste. These particles are small enough to pass through the lungs into the bloodstream and other organs. It can aggravate illnesses like asthma, COPD, heart disease, stroke and lung cancer. Our sensors have shown a threefold increase since February 2020 and I would observe substantial peaks whenever a local bonfire was started.

This would be bad enough in ordinary times, but during a respiratory pandemic it is particularly dangerous. My wife works as an A&E nurse at the PRUH and tells me of the awful breathing difficulties the virus perpetrates.

That is why, I, along with a few other concerned residents have started the campaign group Ban Bromley Bonfires. We are calling on Bromley council to issue a ban on bonfires during COVID19 as seen with other councils such as Lewisham who have issued an amber alert on the matter. We have set up a petition on the link below and ask other concerned residents to support the cause:

https://tinyurl.com/banbromleybonfires

With waste centres now re-opening and hopefully residents thinking twice before they light up, I hope to report better air quality news in the future!

Figure 1

Figure 2: PM2.5 levels observed on Stephen Sangster’s private sensor in Bromley. Pre-lockdown PM2.5 levels were not available on the Breathe London site at Harwood Road Bromley so comparison was not possible. Figure 1: No2 µg m-3. An average of 3 key sites in London was taken for this analysis – Oxford Street, Buckingham Palace Road and Woolwich flyover. Bromley results from private analysis by Stephen Sangster on a kerbside B road location in Bromley – similar month on month results seen at the Breathe London monitoring site in Harwood Road Bromley.