The European Union has agreed to set stricter limits on the toxic particles and dangerous gas that dirty its air, but will not aim for the levels that doctors and economists recommend.
The new rules slash the yearly limits for fine particulates known as PM2.5 – which wreak havoc on the whole body because they are small enough to slip into the bloodstream – from 25 µg/m³ to 10 µg/m³, and for nitrogen dioxide, a gas that hurts the lungs, from 40 µg/m³ to 20 µg/m³.
But the 2030 targets still allow twice as much pollution as the guideline levels set by the World Health Organization.
The EU environment commissioner, Virginijus Sinkevičius, said the upgrade set Europe on track to make air pollution a problem of the past. “Air pollution is still the number one environmental health problem in the EU. The good news is that clean air policy works, and our air quality is improving.”
The law, which must be formally adopted before it comes into effect, was watered down to include loopholes that let member states delay meeting the targets by up to a decade. Governments can postpone the 2030 deadline by five to seven years if projections show that the limit values cannot be met on time, according to the commission, and by 10 years in areas with difficult geography or in which the targets can only be met with “significant” impact on domestic heating systems.
But the law also gives citizens the right to compensation when governments fail to follow the measures and damage their health as a result. It also calls for air quality plans for countries exceeding limits and roadmaps for all member states that lay out how they will comply with the 2030 targets.
Mark Nieuwenhuijsen, an environmental epidemiologist at ISGlobal, a health research institute in Barcelona, said the WHO guidelines would “ideally” have been adopted without delay, but that the deal would still stop many people from dying early.
“Overall, I think this is a major step forward for people’s health. It is a once-in-a-generation chance to improve air quality.”
Bad air is one of the biggest killers in Europe. As well as the human cost of lives lost and lived with disability, air pollution hurts economies by forcing workers to take more sick days and governments to spend more money on hospital beds.
An impact assessment from the European Commission that studied three scenarios found that fully meeting the WHO guidelines by 2030 would deliver the greatest net economic benefit, saving the EU €38bn (£32bn) a year. Member states fought efforts to fully align with the WHO and introduced loopholes to delay even the weaker limits.
On Wednesday, public health experts called on the EU to swiftly put the agreement into law, and for national governments and cities to set policies to meet the new limits.
“The EU air quality standards need to be urgently updated,” said Christiaan Keijzer, the president of the Standing Committee of European Doctors. He said: “Doctors across Europe agree that we need better air quality, and public authorities and national governments need to act to help lessen the disease burden.”
Air pollution hits vulnerable groups hardest, such as children, older people and those with underlying illness. Poorer people also tend to live closer to factories and motorways, further away from parks and public transport, and in worse-quality houses heated with dirtier fuels.
A Guardian investigation in September found that 98% of Europeans were breathing air dirty enough to exceed WHO limits, with people in central Europe, eastern Europe and Italy inhaling the most polluted substances.
Milka Sokolović, the director general of the European Public Health Alliance, said that an ambitious air quality directive was a “crucial” component for tackling health inequities across Europe and “a piece of legislation that ensures that everyone in Europe, especially those in vulnerable and marginalised communities, breathe clean air”.
