See the full picture: There is less net of the improvement in air quality through measures to curb the Covid-19 virus

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Although measures to curb the Corona virus have (almost) brought many polluters to a standstill, the effects on the trends from measurements are not as obviously visible as some may have expected. In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Dr. Birgit Fullerton, Head of Data Sience of Hawa Dawa, mentions possible reasons why the effects of the lock-down are not more clearly and sustainably recognizable in the air pollutant concentration in the area of Munich Airport (Süddeutsche Zeitung “At the airport you can hear the sparrows chirping”). Read more

Use of Low-Cost Air Quality Monitoring Devices for Assessment of Road Transport Related Emissions

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In their study, which has been published in Science Direct, Nihan Celikkaya, Matthew Fullerton (Hawa Dawa) and Birgit Fullerton (Hawa Dawa), the focus was to see overall trends and sensor reactions to the changes in background air pollutant concentrations, wind speeds and traffic volumes: Comprehensive information on air quality is very important for development and assessment of air pollution reduction measures, especially for urban areas facing these problems. Such information is useful not only for monitoring of air quality levels but also for validation of air quality modelling tools. These tools are used, among many application fields, to assess road transport related air pollution as well as to investigate impacts of traffic management measures. Today, in addition to high precision monitoring stations in the cities, there are several low-cost monitoring devices available which can provide additional information on a larger area with less costs. This paper investigates the utilization of such devices as an additional data source for air quality assessment through a case study in the city of Munich and focuses on PM10 measurements. Read more