When the PM10 dust settles . . .

By Myles Quigley, TSI Product Manager, Environmental & Exposure Monitoring - EMEA

At some point this year, the UK government’s Environment Bill will finally complete its passage through parliament and set in law significant new governance structures for managing and improving the environment. The responsibility for holding the government to account will fall on the shoulders of the newly created “Office for Environmental Protection." This agency is essentially an environmental watchdog tasked with providing independent oversight and assessment of the government’s progress. The OEP will have the power to scrutinise environmental policy and law, investigate complaints, and take enforcement action against public authorities where necessary.

So, what does this mean for industry and specifically what does this mean for the construction industry?

As yet there are no clear signs that planning laws or application processes will change but it’s likely that new developments will be subject to a greater degree of scrutiny. As expected, air quality features heavily in the bill and in particular pollutants such as PM2.5 and NO2. Air quality assessments for new developments will need to comply with any changes and it’s expected that the latest more sophisticated computer modelling techniques will be used. Such models will help a developer identify pollution hotspots and provide the needed data to design out risk and reduce exposure. Technology is going to play an important part, and future air quality assessments will need to model how pollutants disperse and where hotspots can occur.

What about the effects on local air quality during the construction phase?

Read Part 2 of this series. 

Additional resources

• Medical leaders urge Boris Johnson to bring air pollution below WHO limit (Guardian)

About the author

Myles Quigley is a product manager at TSI for environmental and exposure monitoring. Since joining the company in 2018 he has worked closely with both industry and government to understand the legislation and customer requirements that drive this space. Prior to joining TSI he worked as a Global Product Manager in various industries such as building automation and renewable energy. Myles started his career as a graduate Building Services Engineer before making his move into product management fifteen years ago. During this time he has worked with numerous universities and research institutes, including KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm and Dresden University of Technology, and many more.