“Revolutionising our understanding of air pollution”
In their Racing Green podcast, Dmytro Chupryna, our ESG Partnerships Director, talks to Jeffrey Young of The Camden Clean Air Initiative about AirScape.

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After years of deep scientific research, extensive media coverage and high-profile celebrity attention, reducing CO2 emissions to prevent climate change is deemed almost exclusively the most pressing global threat to humanity. 

Yet alongside this, another invisible threat deeply linked to our way of life has gone unnoticed. With some 4.2 billion people living in urban environments today, the health impacts of air pollution are intensifying on a global scale. Airborne pollutants lead to cardiovascular and respiratory diseases such as lung cancer, pulmonary fibrosis and acute asthma. It’s predicted an additional 10 million unnecessary deaths across the globe – almost double that of COVID to date – will take place this year alone. The OECD predicts outdoor air pollution could cost 1% of global GDP, around 2.6 trillion us dollars by 2060. 

So with these significant concerns and spiralling health costs, how can we make the changes necessary to clear the air in our cities?

Welcome to Racing Green

The podcast that explores the ideas, innovations and influencers making waves in the journey towards a sustainable future for our planet. In each episode, we investigate the new challenges, ingenious solutions and the undiscovered opportunities that lie at the heart of our rapidly changing world. We aim to accelerate a new era, founded on optimism and impactful collective responsibility. 

Today we chat with Dmytro Chupryna, Sales and Business Development Director at AirLabs, to explore how the rollout of a revolutionary dense network of air quality sensors in our own local area of Camden, north London, could provide the vital data needed to ensure the future health of our cities around the globe.

Welcome Dmytro

Thank you so much for the invitation. I’m glad to be here. 

I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about what, what is air pollution actually? What are the main pollutants that we look to when we’re discussing air pollution?

Air pollution is considered to be one of the biggest threats to wellbeing across the globe for millions and millions of people. And it’s considered by WHO that over 8 million people die each year because of air pollution. And it causes long-term and short-term diseases for hundreds and millions of people across the globe. So, it became a health problem, number one, and a death rate even higher than COVID of any known disease. So millions and millions of people and scientists are trying to find a solution to this problem. And we want to be part of that, and we want to help communities, help governments, help scientists to understand air pollution and tackle it.

Great. Well, you know, you are involved in this incredible project called AirScape. I wonder if you’d tell us a little bit about AirScape. 

The key problem we’ve found out, and the roots of our solution AirScape, came from long-term scientific research, led by our R&D team in Copenhagen, and led by our Chief Science Officer Matthew Johnson.

The system of air quality monitoring which currently exists in London, Camden, and also globally, refers to very dispersed reference stations. If we compare that to, for example, a situation in hospitals, where you have all the patients, and you measure only the average temperature for all the patients they have, which is nonsense. We have the same situation with air pollution. So, for example, in Camden, there are only four reference stations, dispersed kilometres away from each other. And they calculate average air pollution levels in Camden, for example, and broader in London, of course. But eventually, you’ll receive the same data on Euston Road as in Hamstead Heath, which of course doesn’t make sense.

So AirScape is a solution where we try to deploy denser networks of air pollution sensors, an average distance of 10 square metres, so we can understand the air pollution level on each particular street, in each particular corner and in many, many places around Camden. So our model provides people with real-time, street-level data on air pollution, available to everyone.

So, what are we measuring? And what, what types of pollutants are we actually measuring? 

A very wide range of pollutants exist in our world, but the key drivers of pollution in London are four components which our system is monitoring. So it’s Ozone, NO₂ and two types of particulate matter, 2.5 and 10.

These are the main drivers of air pollution. Each has its own characteristics, and each of them concerns different types of diseases. And of course, all of them contribute more generally to climate change and see problems with CO2. They come from different types of human activity. Mostly, of course, from fuel from cars, construction sites, different types of businesses and activities of industry activities. So, it’s a combination of different factors. London and Camden is a very dangerous place to live. And that’s something we need to, tackle for our children, for our generations and for ourselves as well. 

So how did this idea for AirScape come about?

So the key idea takes its roots from the problems we had with different air quality monitoring projects. Because we have plenty of them across the globe and plenty of them in London, but there’s no real one data point and they use different models, which can of course create results, you know, for a particular territory, for particular schools or for particular roads. But we can’t really detect the whole picture. So the idea came about that you can’t tackle something if you can’t measure it. And there was a process to understand how we can measure. And the only solution which was really practical and sustainable is to create these dense networks of air quality monitors. This kind of solution provides us with sustainable data, as well, we took four years of research and development of particular sensors, so they’re not so expensive. And secondly, they create the most spatial resolution and more time frequent data measurement. Classical sensors, or reference stations, do calculations and take data only once an hour. So, yes, of course, you can understand something from that data, but if you particularly want to tackle a solution of a number of buses coming from a particular street, at a particular time, you can’t really measure it and work with the data if you only take it one hour. So our sensors take data every single minute. It’s not only about sensors and hardware. AirScape is a data solution. So, last week, we launched a beta version of our map, which is available to everyone on the website airscape.ai. Currently, our pilot project is covering only Camden, but we of course have ambitions to create this network in other boroughs of London and beyond London as well.

So it’s a real-time system, every minute?

It’s real time, every minute. And everyone who goes to the map on laptops or on their phones can see the level of pollution, and they see the resolution of it. So you can see actually how it changes from street to street. And as well, there’s a mostly permanent spot at Euston Road, of course, because it’s one of the most polluted streets, considered to be even in Europe. You can also search for the location. You can choose your school, for example, the place where you live. And then for each location, you’ll have a history of the data, for the whole period of those sensors operating, and for the previous hour, previous day or one week or one month, so there’s a different timeline. And also there’s a drop-down by pollutants. So you can see which pollutant dominates in your particular area. And on top of that, to make it user-friendly, we developed AQI, which is AirScape Quality Index and a leaf rating. So you can always, for each location, understand how bad it is in general and compare it to other locations as well.

Oh, AQI that sounds fascinating.

How do these sensors themselves actually work? I mean, I wonder if you can describe to our listeners what does this sensor look like and what’s inside it and how does it actually measure? How does it work? 

Yeah, difficult within the podcast because you can’t show them, but it’s actually quite a small device, which will fit in your hand, less than one kilogram. And it’s a device which has a combination of different sensors for each pollutant, combined together with data transmission components which use a 4G signal to send the data to our hubs and servers. Therefore, of course, it needs electricity and it’s located currently on lampposts, but the solution can be put on walls as well. The lamppost solution was the most feasible because it needed height and an open area. And of course, they have electricity, and you can create this kind of grid type of network. And based on the data we’ve seen from all these sensors; we interpolate them and understand the real-time data in each particular location in between those sensors.

And, and there’s AI built into this system?

Some bits of it. It’s mostly maths models which consider because air pollution also depends on multiple factors. It’s like a landscape; the height, the wind, and the temperature outside (if is freezing cold or it’s super-hot) so you need to consider all of these elements to receive realistic data so it’s not corrupted by any of this. But also you need to understand the geographic model for this particular territory. So it will be different because, if you have houses and different kinds of obstacles, you need to consider how air flows through the streets. So that’s also a big part of the development of the system and a big part, a big component of it is actually that’s in the model. It has taken a couple of years to finesse it, but now it’s stable, live and it’s proven within different research and pilot projects. 

I’ve had a chance, lucky enough to have a chance, to have a look at the online site. And it looks incredible because you can zoom in and zoom out and you can look at the history and you know, for those that might be listening that live in the borough of Camden, it’s amazing. You can check your own street out. You can check your own school out. As you mentioned earlier. What are some of the uses? What are the actual practical uses that businesses or the community can actually make of this network? 

Yeah, the key thing to understand is that data and air pollution and data on different environmental problems will be the most demanded data in years ahead. Cause as I mentioned before, you need to solve the problem, and do it by small actions. Sometimes it can be bigger, but if you look at your community, at the place where you live, even small activities, small things can change the situation radically. If all parents stop driving their kids to one particular school, the air quality will be improved during the hours they drop the children, for example. Or if you navigate the traffic in a better way, or if you put some kind of restrictions in this particular manner. But to understand whether your step is successful or not, you need to measure it before and measure it after.

So our system allows local authorities, families, community groups, and community activists to actually have the data, to work with it and to understand how their actions, or potential actions, could improve the situation. So this is the key thing that we provide this data for free for everyone, and then people can act on it and make some very important life decisions. Relocating for example, or, you know, limiting some kind of activities in the peak hours, being outside. Or taking safer routes while cycling or walking in their neighbourhood. And of course, businesses, businesses will be required to decrease the amount of pollution they produce. And therefore these data can be used, first of all, to put pressure on businesses, but secondly, for them to monitor themselves and to actually report to communities, to people that they are improving, so they can have proof of it.

So that’s the key idea that it’s not only having this data, it’s also doing something, and using this data. And the big thing is that researchers, academics, and health professionals, will all need this data for their particular research on air pollution, and all health problems related to that. And our system allows having this kind of really high-resolution data

To bring something together like this, you’ve obviously gotta have a very highly skilled team of engineers, data scientists, and project managers. So how has all this come together? Logistically? 

Yeah, so we need to deploy sensors, operate them, power them up, and locate them in particular locations. So therefore we need first, local government or local authorities for each particular borough, or it can be a citywide solution, to get all the approvals and their support of it. But we see boroughs and local governments being supportive of that because it’s a very important part of their strategy and commitments. So usually they’re receiving that really well. 

Secondly, you need to produce the devices. The first part of it was developed in our labs in Copenhagen and there have been five generations of those sensors, to create the most reliable one. 

And of course, there’s a software team, a very professional one, which creates the data modelling and data mapping on top of the data received from hardware.

This type of system, which connects hardware, software, and data-focused platform, doesn’t exist anywhere else. There are many companies that produce sensors. There are many kinds of crowdfunding/crowdsourcing campaigns on their solution. There are sporadic research projects. There are data platforms which try to use reference stations’ data, but you can’t get any resolution from that, so the data you have is very, very average. So the combination of [AirScape] is the only one solution that exists. Therefore, we’re really keen to spread it across London and go to other cities in the world, and to the most problematic cities in the world which are, of course, the biggest capitals.

Well, it’s amazing to have probably the densest real-time network of air quality sensors in our own borough of Camden, in our own city of London. Who pays for all this and how can it be financially supported? 

So we invested in deploying the network. But, uh, if you come to our map, you’ll see the map of sensors and you see a map of sponsors. We encourage local businesses and bigger companies to support us because, to maintain the network, it needs resources. So therefore we have sponsorship prices, quite small ones, and everyone can come to our platform and sponsor one, two or 10 sensors. And for these sponsors, for the users, we will provide more access to the platform with different features. Plus their logo can be seen so the community and the users will see which of the companies are really taking care of it and supporting it. 

Also, we work with bigger companies. We only launched our pilot model here in Camden, but we see that the big companies, and those companies that are the drivers of air pollution, should be responsible, and support the maintenance of such networks – to keep them alive and to keep this data available to everyone. So we see them and foundations, and maybe sometimes governments as key sources who need to support us and provide this data to people, citizens, community groups, activists, and everyone because we can only estimate how many lives this data can save a year. People with special conditions need to know air quality data right now, and also be alert of any kind of incidents or higher pollution levels happening. So we truly believe that if we do it together, and people will join more and more and support the network, we can at least decrease this 8 million dramatic number of deaths from air pollution. And effectively everyone will save their own lives because, as long as you live in a very air polluted area, the higher chance you’ll have of long-term diseases or just shorter, shorter life. So no one wants that. We see it as a collective action and we encourage everyone to go to the map, check the project and, either support or bring companies and businesses who can support this network.

So, Camden, you’ve got the prototype. It’s amazing what you’ve achieved so far. What are the next steps? 

Among the next steps, we have the ambition to go to the five major cities in the world and deploy a network or pilot project there by the end of the year. But our key goal is to cover 200 major cities around the globe, in a five, 10-year time perspective.

And the history started in Camden. There was a combination of factors, of course. Big support from The Camden Clean Air Initiative, from activists from the community, and from local borough authorities. London, I think at the end of March, had the highest pollution, even bigger than in Beijing. So London is really a critical city to start with. I think it brings a lot of visibility and credibility to our solution. So we thank everyone who supported this idea and who keeps supporting it. And we also look forward to multiplying this experience and actually getting London covered. Because if you look at the data, it doesn’t look really good for London. So we need to actually deploy it, and create those big movements and community actions to change the situation. Otherwise, London will become a city that you can’t live in or create long, long, long, long problems for many of its citizens. 

Great. Well, sounds like we might need an Elon Musk or someone to invest in this project! So in the future 5/10 years’ time, you’re in five major cities or you’re or a lot more by that time?

A lot more. We have a preferred list, of course, but it’s a very opportunistic approach because we also have a current pilot project in Milan, where we’ve installed, 10 sensors and created a small network to show the results to the local authorities and environmental agencies. So they see the difference, and they see how it works. And of course, the Camden platform helps us with that. So we have a lot of conversations about different cities and, our air quality network is already installed and working in Cork, a city in Ireland. There was a big demand because of the big port of Dublin – a lot of ships are coming and highly polluting the air inthis small town. So we see Ireland and Dublin as potentially one of the next cities. But we also of course go wide. The globe is big and the problem is huge. So it’s a matter of which locations, which cities are ready, and the potential sponsors who will be willing to invest in that. 

Well, what great work being done by AirLabs with their AirScape project. Thanks so much Dmytro for joining us here today. 

Thank you so much for the invitation. And again, thanks a lot to everyone who supported us and who keeps supporting us.

Today marks the sixth #NationalCleanAirDay

Air pollution is one of the biggest environmental threats to human health, alongside climate change. It’s a public health crisis, happening right now. So much so, the World Health Organization has significantly reduced their air quality guidelines to save millions of lives from air pollution.

With the growing weight of scientific evidence of the health impacts of dirty air, Global Action Plan’s Clear Air Day is about raising awareness of the issue and, quite literally, taking small steps to make a difference.

Air pollution dirties every organ in your body. Take steps to improve your health and the planet this Clean Air Day.

According to their research, a quarter of journeys in England are under one mile, so walking, instead of taking the car, can make a big difference.

There are some fantastic free resources available on their website to learn more about your air pollution footprint and ways to reduce it.

Positive initiatives like these show that, as The Global Action Plan says, “there is hope, simple actions do have a positive impact on our health and our communities”.

The problem with air pollution is that current information about air quality is vague at best or simply unavailable.

In other areas of our wellbeing, measurement motivates and inspires us to improve or continue what we’re doing. To keep an eye on our weight, we can look at our BMI or make food choices based on calorific values or fat content. Just as we set exercise goals to be faster or stronger, we need measurement to show progress.

At AirScape, we firmly believe that air quality information should be accessible for everyone in the community. For the first time ever, we want to put actionable air quality information into the hands of the community for the good of the community.

AirScape’s radical new approach to measuring urban air quality can provide the visibility and insight to make effective decisions. Being able to see the actual level of dirty air, from one street to the next, in real time, enables everyone to see how they have a positive impact on our health and communities.

Whether it’s individual quality-of-life actions or clean air policies and regulation, reaching WHO air quality standards is impossible without doing a great job of diagnosing pollution sources in cities. Only then can we all take steps to manage and care for those most affected.

Contact us now to be part of the air quality revolution.

We share the great news that we have merged AirLabs Air Filtration Division with Rensair, a specialist in Indoor Air Quality.

Airlabs will continue under the leadership of Jorge M. Vasquez, to focus on the success of the Air Monitoring Division, including the AirScape/AirNode products.

Rensair has deep experience in hospital-grade air purification and has secured new funding to expand its presence across the world, introduce a broader product portfolio with IoT connectivity, and invest in marketing outreach. The acquisition of established AirLabs products such as the AirBubbl brings complementary filtration and IoT technologies to their product range.

Importantly, the Air Filtration sales and operational teams have transferred to Rensair to ensure our customers’ point of contact and level of service will remain unchanged. They can be assured that they remain a valued partner of AirLabs and now also of Rensair. 

Rensair is on a mission to protect and enhance lives through proven clean air technology. Founded in May 2020 by Danish twins Christian and Frederik Hendriksen, the company – whose over 800 customers include CBRE, Disney, Morgan Stanley, PepsiCo, SNCF, and the UK National Health Service (NHS) – is headquartered in London with operations in the UK, Europe, USA and Asia. More information can be found here.

“The pandemic has taught us that we cannot take air quality for granted, but airborne disease transmission is not the only reason to care about air quality”, said Christian Hendriksen, Co-founder and CEO at Rensair. “The proliferation of environmental pollutants, a rise in drug-resistant bacteria, and the newly identified threat of airborne microplastics are all reasons to improve Indoor Air Quality.” 

“Clean air is of course a defense mechanism against sick building syndrome and absenteeism, but it’s much more than that”, said Frederik Hendriksen, Co-founder and US CEO at Rensair. “It’s been proven to boost productivity and learning and, in one Harvard study, resulted in a 61% increase in cognitive scores. The ROI on Indoor Air Quality is far reaching.”

This exciting development should have limited impact, but please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any queries.  

The AirNode^TM, AirLabs’ advanced air quality sensor, has been awarded the Best Accuracy Award for outdoor PM_2.5 monitoring in Air Parif’s prestigious The Microsensors Challenge competition 2021.

The device is being installed as part of the world’s densest air quality sensor network, AirScape^TM . The network has been designed to transform how we monitor and manage air pollution, providing at least 100x more spatial resolution and refreshing 60x more regularly than other existing networks. AirNode, the key component to the network, enables hyper-local air quality data to be reported every minute to map the issue in real time. This award-winning technology provides minute by minute, street by street visibility on air pollution to drastically improve public health and wellbeing in urban spaces.

The AirNode device was assessed against 28 outdoor air quality sensors around the world in the Air Parif Airlab Microsensors Challenge. The company’s stand-out technology was awarded for its impeccable accuracy that will continue to play a critical role in transforming our knowledge and understanding of air pollution in urban spaces.

The AirNode was acknowledged for its low-maintenance, multi-pollutant measurement, at a competitive price, whilst providing excellent accuracy for PM₁ and PM_2.5.This is part of the company’s pursuit to bring affordable yet accurate sensor technology to the market. The AirNode provides a level of intelligence and accuracy that is critical to understanding and addressing the complex issues of urban air pollution. The AirNode’s award-winning accuracy, affordability and robust nature enables it to provide the level of precise data needed to inform impactful decision-making for all stakeholders interested in improving air quality in urban areas.

Marc Ottolini, CEO of AirLabs said: “There is huge potential for low-cost air quality sensors to help cities around the world to visualising and tackle air pollution at street level. AirParif’s Airlab challenge is instrumental in benchmarking sensors from many countries and drive innovation forward. We are proud to be one of the category winners in this year’s competition.”

Alongside PM₁ and PM_2.5, the AirNode device also measures a wider range of airborne particulate matter and toxic gases including nitrogen dioxide (NO₂), ozone (O₃) and carbon dioxide (CO₂) as well as temperature and humidity.

The Microsensors Challenge, organised by the leading air quality authority in Paris, Air Parif, was launched in response to the air pollution crisis, responsible for seven million premature deaths per year globally. The Challenge informs the growing international interest in air quality sensors on the most effective technologies on the market.

The world’s densest air quality sensor network will be installed in Camden, London, this summer, which aims to fundamentally transform how we monitor and manage air pollution to improve public health and well-being in urban spaces.

Air quality specialists AirLabs will install 250 advanced AirNode air quality sensors across the Borough, in partnership with Camden Council and The Camden Clean Air Initiative, an air pollution action group in the Borough.

The network will provide at least 100x more spatial resolution and refresh 60x more regularly than the network of existing air quality reference stations in Camden, capturing and reporting hyper-local air quality data every minute to map the issue in real time. The data will contribute to impactful decision making for all stakeholders interested in improving air quality in the Borough, from councils, individuals and communities to schools, offices, hospitals, retail and hospitality businesses.

The sensors will be deployed rapidly over the coming months and will complement the existing air quality monitoring network. Once launched, the data generated from the network can be used in a myriad of ways, enabling the public to map less polluted routes from A-to-B, feeding into local traffic management policy and providing NHS Trusts and schools with information to help raise awareness of air pollution and protect vulnerable communities. The future possibilities of how the data can be used are vast and AirLabs is aiming to engage with potential partners, clean air groups and councils to explore future collaboration.

Marc Ottolini, CEO of AirLabs, said: “Our ultra-dense network of sensors will provide unprecedented ultra-high definition visibility of local air pollution to allow communities, businesses and stakeholders to make more informed choices to protect the health and well-being of the local population.

“There’s no time to wait in tackling the air pollution crisis – we all contribute to air pollution, and we all suffer the health impacts that it causes. This new information system empowers us all to enact data-driven change and become part of the solution.

“Camden Council understands the importance of empowering the community to tackle this vital issue head on. This network will serve as a blueprint for boroughs across London and cities around the world, using the power of data to inform meaningful action and protect populations from the invisible threat of air pollution.”

Camden Council is at the forefront for driving change on air pollution having been the first to adopt World Health Organization air quality standards and with a host of initiatives already in place is partnering with AirLabs on this innovative project to realise its vision for a healthy and resilient borough.

Camden Councillor Adam Harrison said: “Camden’s citizens have made clear that more must be done to tackle the air quality health crisis, and Camden Council has committed to the meeting the World Health Organization air quality standards as well as stepping up our pollution monitoring and efforts to raise public awareness about the health risks from exposure to air pollution. This project will form an important part of our work to protect public health by building a more detailed understanding of the sources of air pollution throughout Camden and the actions we can all take to reduce pollution and our exposure to it.”

The dense network of AirNode sensor devices has been strategically designed to cover the entire borough of Camden, including areas underrepresented by the existing monitoring network and those most vulnerable to air pollution – schools, transport hubs, healthcare facilities and busy intersections. Each device will measure a wide range of air pollutants including airborne particulate matter and toxic gases (nitrogen dioxide (NO₂)_, carbon dioxide (CO₂) and ozone (O₃)), as well as temperature and humidity, giving the full picture of air quality in an area.

Devices will be optimally spaced to identify and differentiate between different sources of pollution, including whether they are localised sources such as road traffic and wood-burning, or regional sources such as industry. The devices will be installed on lampposts, buildings and other suitable infrastructure and take measurements every minute enabling detection of the smallest of changes.

Air quality is a localised issue, with pollution levels differing significantly from street to street. Even the most advanced air quality networks currently lack a street level understanding of air quality and gaps in the data mean that communities are missing the complete picture when it comes to the quality of air outside their homes, schools and offices.

The announcement of the network follows a recent coroner’s ruling which called on Government and local authorities to increase air quality monitoring and to do more to raise public awareness of the health risks from air pollution exposure. The government has pledged to significantly increase the air quality monitoring network in the UK and this project will act as a blueprint to demonstrate the benefits of a dense monitoring network.[1]

Prashant Kumar, Chair & Professor of Air Quality and Health, University of Surrey, said: “Research has shown that air pollution is hyper-local as well as regional. We need many air quality monitoring devices in a dense network to describe it accurately, diagnose the problem and identify sources and solutions.

“Dense networks of air quality sensor nodes recording in real-time, measuring a full range of pollutants from noxious gases to tiny particulates, are an important step towards winning the fight against air pollution and providing clean air for everyone.”

This revolutionary approach has been designed to engage everyone. AirLabs and The Camden Clean Air Initiative will work closely in encouraging local groups, businesses, NGOs and members of the public to ‘adopt an AirNode’ and engage with the data on the exciting new air quality map and analytics platform, launching in the autumn.

Jeffrey Young, CEO of Camden Clean Air Initiative said: “During the COVID-19 pandemic, walking on our streets became more enjoyable as there were fewer cars on the road and less vehicle-derived pollution in the air. This flagship project aims to provide the council and our community with the data needed to get us back to that point – improving the health and well-being of our residents for the long term.

“Two key elements of The Camden Clean Air Initiative’s vision when we were founded were to fill the Borough with real-time air quality sensors and to put Camden on the map as a centre of excellence for sustainability and Greentech. By partnering with AirLabs we hope to achieve both these things.”

In London alone, air pollution accounts for approximately 4,100 premature deaths every year, worsening the impacts of lung and heart conditions as well as other respiratory illnesses including COVID-19. Killing more people annually than road traffic accidents, poor air quality costs society, businesses and our NHS services more than £15 billion a year. Air quality also has a proven impact on educational attainment and overall physical and mental well-being.

[1] DEFRA – Government response to the Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah Coroner’s report

One of the defining images from the past year was the sight of the world’s great cities standing empty, as people around the globe were ordered to stay home to stop the spread of COVID-19.

The desertion of our cities led to a striking reduction in air pollution, with the Centre for Cities reporting a 60 per cent drop during the first lockdown in some areas of the UK and reports of 150 fewer air pollution-related deaths in Spain in the same period.

The physical impacts of air pollution are well reported – it’s now considered to be the world’s largest environmental health threat, accounting for almost nine million deaths every year and reducing life expectancy by an average of 2.9 years for people across the globe.

But the impact on mental health is often overlooked. A recent study in London found that increases in the key air pollutants – PM_2.5, NO_x and NO₂ – are associated with up to 39% increased odds of common mental disorders.

As lockdown restrictions ease and our cities begin to come back to life, governments around the world must take action now to tackle the air pollution crisis and protect our physical and mental health.

An increasing threat

Air pollution levels have slowly crept up since the first lockdown and there is real concern that they may continue to increase beyond pre-pandemic levels. This is largely due to people using their cars more frequently because of a reluctance to return to public transport. YouGov research revealed that 60% of people in Brazil would use their car more following the pandemic and 40% of respondents in the US and Australia also said they expected to drive more.

This is a concerning trend and should be tackled as a matter of urgency. We must make public transport the quickest, cheapest and safest way to travel around our urban spaces or the rapid, dramatic drop in ridership will become permanent. 

During the pandemic, urban spaces have opened up and become pedestrianised to enable cafes, bars and restaurants to serve customers outside. We should aim to lock in these changes to remove cars from our towns and cities longer term.

But we can and must do more. In the UK, we learnt in this week’s Queen’s Speech that the Environment Bill will return after months of delays caused by the pandemic, and is set to include a framework for tackling air pollution. That framework has to set legal limits on air pollution and funding must be made available to our towns, cities and public transport operators to make long-lasting change to tackle the issue.

Sleepwalking into a mental health crisis

The pandemic has placed real strain on the mental health of people around the world, who have had to adjust to living in increased isolation under lockdown. 

A Swiss study found that many young adults, and young women in particular, experienced symptoms of mental illness during the first lockdown. More than half of young women and 38% of young men reported mild to severe symptoms of depression. The results relating to anxiety were similar. 

A study co-led by City, University of London and UCL researchers found that those with pre-existing mental health conditions were especially impacted by the COVID-19 lockdowns, due to the loss of normal coping routines, barriers to accessing care, and the unequal impacts of the pandemic.

With air pollution expected to increase in urban spaces and a fragile public returning to our cities, there is potential for us to sleepwalk into a post-pandemic mental health crisis.

So what can be done by politicians to tackle this combined threat? 

Tackling urban air pollution

Along with pedestrianizing our cities and introducing legal limits on air pollution, there are a host of other measures that could protect bodies and minds.

The first and most important step is to act smarter in how we monitor air pollution in urban spaces.

Currently most cities install a limited number of monitoring stations in a few areas where air quality is expected to be a problem. While this setup can indicate air conditions in a city, crucially, it lacks the ability to pick up on localised and/or short-lived pollution hotspots.

This is a profound issue as air pollution is extremely dynamic, fluctuating significantly in time as well as location. For example, Imperial College London’s regular pollution monitoring shows that air quality can be four times worse in some streets than others, even within the same district.

Well-intentioned local authorities rightly want to improve the air quality in their urban spaces. But their limited data only offers a tiny fragment of the picture necessary to make informed and impactful decisions – meaning significant sums of public money can be spent without addressing the issue.

This has to change, and it will only change by using monitoring technology that gives decision makers a full and detailed picture of the air pollution problem in their cities. 

By creating a dense, high-resolution network of air-monitoring sensors and a visualisation and analytics software platform such as our AirIntel system, local authorities, health groups, businesses and communities will be able to assess air pollution data across an entire city. 

The real-time data enables us to build an accurate and useful picture of exposure – creating a detailed map that can be used to gain a full understanding of pollution hotspots and provide real insight into which mitigations will have the most impact and best protect the public. It can provide information for health researchers or can be shared with the public to advise on the healthiest route for them to commute, or even where to live and work to reduce their exposure to air pollution.

Another solution, which can help to reduce the cars on our roads by encouraging people back into public transport, is the AirBubbl, our in-vehicle air-cleaning device, which removes more than 95% of airborne viruses and contaminated particulate matter, including airborne coronavirus. The AirBubbl floods the vehicle with over 30,000 litres of clean air every hour, creating and replenishing a clean air zone for the driver and passengers to keep them safe.

Rethinking our cities following COVID-19

Mental Health Awareness Week gives us an opportunity to reflect on a challenging year for all of us, but also to think about the society we want to create after the pandemic.

In much of the western world, we are on the verge of tackling the invisible threat of COVID-19, but we must act now to mitigate the long-term mental health impacts of the virus.  

To do that we must reshape our cities and place health and wellbeing at their heart: by pedestrianizing public spaces, reducing traffic congestion, investing in public transport, and tackling the air pollution crisis before it’s too late.

Written by Matthew Johnson, chief science officer at AirLabs and professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen.

Air pollution is without question one of the greatest public health concerns of our time, contributing to 9% of all deaths globally.¹

These health impacts have been brought into focus by COVID-19, as there is a growing body of scientific research which suggests a strong link between exposure to air pollution and mortality rates for COVID-19. Even a small, one percentage point increase in people’s long-term exposure to particulate matter raises infections and admissions by about 10% and deaths by 15%.²

This has caused an increase in support for action against air pollution. The public overwhelmingly feel that the issue of clean air is more important than ever before and want businesses to act now to improve air quality as we rebuild following the virus.³

We are already seeing local authorities start to implement new measures to reorganise and transform travel in cities by bringing in new pedestrianised areas and cycle lanes, so now is the perfect time for public health officials and city planners to take long-term action to protect the public from this invisible killer.

Air pollution monitoring – A shot in the dark

There is undoubtably a willingness from government, councils and the public to tackle the air pollution crisis across the globe. However, if we want to have a long-term and lasting impact on air quality then we need to act smarter.

Air pollution monitoring up until now has been a shot in the dark, as most cities only install a limited number of monitoring stations in a few sections of the city where air quality is expected to be a problem.

While this setup can indicate air conditions in a city, crucially, it lacks the ability to pick up on localised hotspots of pollution.

This is a profound issue as air pollution is extremely dynamic, fluctuating significantly in time as well as location. For example, monitoring pollution in London by Imperial College⁴ regularly shows that air quality can be four times worse in some streets than others, even within the same district.

Well-intentioned local authorities rightly want to improve the air quality in their urban spaces. But the limited data they have means that they are spending significant sums of public money to address the issue, with only a tiny fragment of the picture necessary to make informed and impactful decisions.

This has to change, and it will only change by using monitoring technology that gives decision makers a full and detailed picture of the air pollution problem in their city.

Around every corner, there is a unique story and that story changes day by day, therefore, it is crucial that air monitoring networks reflect this.

Smart cities need smart technology

A truly smart city is one that is interactive, using real-time information to make decisions for the good of the city and its population. As part of that, an air monitoring network should not be considered as merely a data collection system but as a decision-making tool.

By creating a dense, high resolution network of air monitoring sensors, city leaders are able to assess air pollution data in many locations across an entire city, every minute of the day.

From this they can build an accurate and useful picture of a city’s air conditions – creating a detailed map which can be used by city planners to gain a full understanding of pollution hotspots and can provide real insight into which mitigations will be most impactful to protect the public.

A pioneering project

At AirLabs we’re doing exactly that as part of a new project with ADEPT SIMULATE Live Lab. Working with Staffordshire County Council and Amey, we have installed a first-of-its-kind, dense network of 19 sensors around a busy road in Newcastle Under Lyme.

Our AirNode sensors, which are low cost and low maintenance whilst meeting the requirements for accuracy of the EU Air Quality Directive, are being installed on lampposts around 100m apart to detect the variations of pollutant concentration in space and time throughout the area.

This innovative project not only aims to monitor air pollution, but to test a variety of mitigation solutions in a real-world setting. Those range from using artificial intelligence to monitor and predict traffic, installing an active ‘green wall’ to absorb dangerous air pollutants and deploying e-scooters and e-bikes to encourage alternative transport options.

It will then use the in-depth data obtained using the monitoring network to compare and evaluate which mitigations are most effective.

This will provide a model that can be replicated by councils and city planners around the world to make impactful decisions on air pollution in a cost effective way.

Now is the time to take action for our cities to clean our air and protect the public. The appetite is there from the public, the technology is in place and we’re remodelling our cities in response to COVID-19, so let’s do it in a smart way to deliver real, long term change.

¹ Our World In Data – Air Pollution

² IZA – http://ftp.iza.org/dp13367.pdf

³ Global Action Plan – Air pollution and COVID-19 survey

⁴ https://www.londonair.org.uk/LondonAir/Default.aspx

Every year, during the month of November companies and individuals alike come together to raise awareness of common life-threatening diseases and cancers, including rare diseases that develop in the lungs. As individuals become increasingly concerned over environmental pollution and airborne contaminants, combined awareness efforts engage, educate, and encourage individuals and community leaders to address air quality; such as the presence of carcinogenic materials and air pollutants resulting from heavy manufacturing, traffic congestion and more.

However, although advancements in air monitoring and filtration equipment have made it easier for both individuals and communities to track and manage pollution, it is crucial to health, to know exactly how and which airborne contaminants and pollutants cause respiratory health concerns and numbers don’t lie. Nearly 1 in 8 deaths are attributed to air pollution, making pollution one of the largest environmental health concerns at present. Other environmental health concerns such as airborne asbestos or erionite fibers are just as concerning, so in observation of Lung Cancer Awareness month this November, we’ve joined forces with the Mesothelioma + Asbestos Awareness Center to raise awareness of harmful airborne pollutants and carcinogens to prevent their exposure and draw attention to the health concerns associated with air pollution.

Carcinogenic Materials:

Over the past 100 years, manufacturing processes have changed significantly. However, some industries still utilise carcinogenic minerals or additives for a verity of different purposes. For example, the naturally occurring mineral asbestos maintains fire-resistant properties under direct contact with an open flame. Once processed, the brittle and fibrous mineral became a common ingredient within thousands of products stretching across the construction and manufacturing industries. Due to the malleability and fibrous nature of asbestos, it found its way into a variety of different applications, world-wide including plumbing, HVAC, electric, insulation, roofing, tiling, cement, concrete, paints, gaskets, and other materials found in structures or machines built prior to 1980.

Exposure to airborne asbestos is especially hazardous, causing severe lung damage, inflammation, and eventually, asbestosis or mesothelioma, a life-threatening rare disease, which develops in the lining of the lungs, abdomen or heart. Although classified as a rare disease, the only scientifically proven cause of mesothelioma is a result of asbestos inhalation or ingestion. Erionite is another similar, fibrous mineral, which has been linked to peritoneal mesothelioma of the abdomen, so it is crucial to health that workers in high risk occupations such as; construction, manufacturing, plumbing, mining, railroads, and shipbuilding are informed and aware of the dangers of such carcinogens.

Heavy Manufacturing & Combustion:

Pollution generation from manufacturing, industrial practices and combustion, vehicle exhaust, and even construction debris, can toxify and contaminate air quality with particulate matter and Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2), directly affect human health. Such processes produce, often-invisible clouds of airborne hazards that are known to cause respiratory health concerns including asthma, lung disease and cancer.

Depending on the source, particulate matter (PM), dust or pollen, mould spores, soot, and airborne acids, may also be released into the air as a result of the above processes, posing additional threat to health. With extended exposure, individuals may experience worsening allergies or respiratory issues and are at risk of developing more serious complications such as COPD.

Vehicle Exhaust and NO₂

There are two main sources of air pollution: mobile sources and stationary sources. Mobile sources including cars, buses, vans, motorbikes or cycles, planes and trains, which each contribute to pollution. Mobile sources running on diesel fuel especially, release NO₂ into the air, as well as PM, which pose respiratory health concerns such as intense asthma, coughing, bronchitis, among other issues, to those who inhale it. NO₂ also plays a large roll in smog formation, which is prevalent in cities across the globe.

Vehicle exhaust also emits Nitrogen Oxides (NOx) including NO and NO₂, formed from nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere when air is exposed to intense heat such as with lightning or combustion, making cities packed with vehicles, extremely prone to nitrogen oxide pollution.

With every breath of polluted air consumed each day, the lungs, one of the 5 vital organs essential to human life, are directly affected. Little by little and especially over time, lung function is impaired, which as a result directly affects blood-flow and health of other parts of the body.

World-renowned astrophysicist, Stephen Hawking once stated that, “air pollution is one of the top 3 threats to our global society.” His statement is simple, yet profound and based on fact as the World Health Organisation attributed nearly 7 million deaths to our global air problem, air pollution, in 2012. Considering this number aside the 1.69 million lives attributed to lung cancer, air pollution, airborne toxins and carcinogens deserve attention year round, in addition to Lung Cancer Awareness Month.