Air Quality Worsened Dramatically

DOCTORS for the Environment released a report today showing air quality has markedly deteriorated in the Hunter and putting people’s health at risk.

In the Upper Hunter the air quality in Muswellbrook, Singleton, Camberwell, Maison Dieu, Mt Thorley and Warkworth all exceed the national standards and in some instances were three to four times higher than permissible.

The report detailed coarse particle pollution had exceeded national standards in nine locations, up from two locations in 2017 and none in 2016 and for fine particle pollution 14 locations exceeded up from 4 to 6 sites in previous years.

Fine particle pollution is linked to heart disease, stroke, deaths, low birth weight for babies and restricted lung growth in children and coarse particle pollution is associated with lung disease, especially lung cancer in non-smokers.

The doctors are calling for:

• modernising coal power stations licences to capture sulphur dioxide and nitrogendioxide;
• pollution checks to remove high air pollution emitting vehicles from our roads;
• higher fees to load based licencing system for industry to compensate for the health costs to the community, and
• restrictions on installation or use of wood fire heaters in urban areas.

Read the full: Report