TRANSPORT SAFETY & SECURITY
Urban Emissions
A TRUE STORY
Despite global efforts to reduce the worst forms of air pollution, urban air quality remains a leading issue for cities across the world, writes Kate Turner. This situation, however, is set to change
More than 80% of people living in urban areas are exposed to air quality levels that exceed the World Health Organization (WHO) limits, representing 88% of all cities worldwide. Vehicle emissions remain a major contributor
Cities face a particular challenge as locations of both dense population and high motorisation. Building policies to protect citizen health, which play an increasingly critical role in protecting the health of our planet through transport decarbonisation, are entirely reliant on strong and reliable data. Increasingly stringent regulations intended to rapidly reduce levels of vehicle emissions by ensuring that no new vehicle was dirtier than the model that came before, achieved some improvements in terms of climate impacts. The real result of the diesel rush, however, was an invisible pollutant spreading across urban spaces at a terrifying rate. As manufacturers and regulators claimed vehicles were getting cleaner and cleaner, the air in the cities in which they were being driven was, in fact, getting dirtier. So what was really happening? These inconsistencies were finally laid bare by the Dieselgate scandal. In the US, work by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) and the Environmental Protection Agency revealed that German automaker VW had been using software to control emissions to pass laboratory tests. Under normal driving conditions these controls were disabled, allowing the cars to spew unregulated emissions into the environment. In fact, a marked difference between on-road and tested emissions had become a feature of vehicles across regions with emissions regulations. The specific cost of this emissions gap is vast; some 37,000 early deaths in Europe alone are directly attributable to the NOx emissions over and above tested levels, according to a recent ICCT report.
HEALTH EMERGENCY
The full health impacts of toxic diesel fumes are still being uncovered, from respiratory difficulties to learning disabilities. Exposure, even before birth, can result in lasting, lifelong challenges, with children the most vulnerable and worst affected. The streets of London have been particularly badly affected by the impact of diesel emissions, described as the city’s ‘health emergency’. Every day these dangerously dirty vehicles pollute the streets, the most vulnerable are at very real risk. A recent investigation found that there are over 800 schools and colleges in the city where pupils are exposed to levels of NOx that breach the European Union's legal limits. One of those at risk was Ella Kissi-Debrah, who made the journey to school every day along one of London’s most polluted roads. Following her death from respiratory failure in 2012, her mother established that air pollution peak days correlated with every single respiratory crisis Ella endured. In 2020, Ella became the first person in the UK to have air pollution listed on their death certificate after the reopened inquest examined those findings, with the coroner finding that air pollution "made a material contribution" to her death.
The full health impacts of toxic diesel fumes are still being uncovered, from respiratory difficulties to learning disabilities. Exposure, even before birth, can result in lasting, lifelong challenges
For cities across the globe, this small legal ruling could become one of the greatest turning points – recognising that dirty air kills. Policies like Low or Zero Emissions Zones (LEZs), fiscal charges, and incentive programmes, can have significant and rapid impacts on air quality, but targeted policies accurately modelling air quality changes are dependant on accurate, real-world data that cities simply did not have.
THIS MUCH IS TRUE
The Real Urban Emissions (TRUE) Initiative was established in 2017 to collect, analyse, and publish real-world vehicle emissions data from city streets. TRUE is a partnership of the FIA Foundation and the International Council on Clean Transportation, with an advisory council of leading experts in the field such as Transport and Environment, C40 Cities and the Clean Air Fund. The Initiative uses remote sensing technology to capture the emissions of vehicles in urban environments, building up an innovative and interactive data set of these real-world readings organised by vehicle family, ranked on their nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions. This data set has two distinct purposes: to provide open data for city administrations to identify their specific emissions challenges; and to provide the public with the real vehicle emission levels when looking to purchase cars. Dubbed ‘uncheatable’ testing by The Guardian, the TRUE Initiative has worked with cities throughout Europe to measure the emissions of their fleets and to use these data to evaluate and support actions to address high emissions. So far, the Initiative has analysed more than 60 million real-world vehicle emissions records, for NOx and a growing range of other emissions, across Europe and the US, with new projects in development and testing stages for Asia, Africa and Latin America to understand unique city fleets, universal trends and the conditions which vary emission performances. “We are trying to make sure there is a steady drumbeat of information about real-world emissions from vehicles so that it continues to be present in the minds of the public, the minds of policy-makers and in the minds of cities,”
explains Sheila Watson, Deputy Director of the FIA Foundation.
We are trying to make sure there is a steady drumbeat of information about real-world emissions from vehicles so that it continues to be present in the minds of the public, the minds of policy-makers and in the minds of cities
The Initiative was launched with Anne Hidalgo, Mayor of Paris, and Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, in whose cities pilot TRUE real-world vehicle testing projects would take place. Mayor Khan said:
“Data from TRUE and ICCT reveals the stark health impact of polluting diesel taxis on our streets. London’s air is so toxic it damages children’s lung growth, causes thousands of premature deaths and increases the risk of asthma and dementia.” In London, 100,000 vehicles on London’s streets were assessed to build a picture of the city’s specific vehicle challenges. Analysis showed the city’s iconic black cabs were disproportionate polluters in the city, responsible for 20% of harmful NOx emissions and were set to become the biggest source of transport pollution in central London by this year. The data became the basis of a new policy to accelerate the electrification of black cabs.
“We know that dirty vehicles are responsible for half of our NOx air pollution,” added Mayor Khan, “it also underlines why we at City Hall have been delivering hard-hitting, urgently needed policies to tackle vehicle emissions.”
The successes of policy are as important to understand as well as the challenges. The impact of public transport is an important part of the city’s mix
TECHNOLOGY’S IMPACT
The successes of policy are as important to understand as well as the challenges. The impact of public transport is an important part of the city’s mix. Testing showed London’s bus fleet saw NOx emissions declined by 65% against those from buses sampled in similar studies conducted in 2012 and 2013, thanks to a range of technical changes. Drew Kodjak, Executive Director of the ICCT, identifies this city engagement as central to addressing the poor air quality on an individual basis, but also to help cities worldwide understand the challenges and solutions.
“We need authorities to commit to continued testing of real-world emissions, to recognise that policies need to be put in place, band to better enforcement of those policies.”
EMISSION ACCOMPLISHED?
For Paris, TRUE data was used to explore the reductions in NOx emissions that would be achieved under the current implementation plan for the city’s Low Emission Zone and estimated the additional reduction benefits that could be realised if those policies were accelerated. Through this work, the TRUE analysis not only identified the effectiveness of the current policy, but also showed that accelerating the implementation schedule would accelerate the air-quality benefits of the low-emission zone. It also identified a 30% increase in nitrogen oxide emissions from diesel cars at higher summer temperatures and reveals motorcycle emissions of certain pollutants “greatly exceed” averages for both petrol and diesel cars – a serious challenge as urban temperatures consistently hit new peaks as a result of climate change. Analysis of measurement campaigns in Brussels and Warsaw are ongoing with data collected during these studies providing important new information on several topics of interest to city officials and European policy-makers, including the real-world emissions performance of the latest Euro 6d certified vehicles, which have not yet been tested at scale. The data we will also provide a clearer picture of how the flow of used vehicles from Western to Eastern vehicle markets is impacting emissions levels of the Eastern European fleet.
Data from Brussels has already been used to support nascent plans to take action on Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) tampering and fraud
Data from Brussels has already been used to support nascent plans to take action on Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) tampering and fraud; malfunctioning DPFs are known to cause particulate matter (PM) emissions to increase by up to 50 times, while the factor of PM number increases can be in the hundreds. Initial TRUE results suggest 5% of tested light-duty diesel Euro 5b and 6 vehicles in Brussels had tailpipe particle-number concentrations exceeding 1 million particles per cubic centimetre, indicating DPF malfunction or tampering, which are estimated to be responsible for more than 90% of total particles emitted from all of the tested Euro 5b and 6 diesel vehicles. TRUE data also looks set to support changes to the Brussels region testing to better identify and take action on these super-polluting vehicles with compromised DPFs. TRUE’s work shows arming cities with the data to analyse their specific emissions challenges is finally giving them the ability to develop informed and tailored solutions to finally curb the invisible urban emissions killer.
Kate Turner is Media & Public Affairs Manager at the FIA Foundation. Contact her at k.turner@fiafoundation.org
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