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Exceedance of air quality standards is a reality, it is increasingly higher from one year to another and all the Romanian public administrations must implement air quality improvement plans of action, Minister of the Environment, Waters and Forests Costel Alexe said on Monday, on the occasion of a visit to the Air Quality Monitoring Station at the National Military Circle in Bucharest.
"We are here today for an on-site visit following the alarming information run in the media. The method to determine whether the concentration of air particulate matter exceeds the standard by more than 50 micrograms per cubic meter is the same across Europe. What the media has presented is an instant situation where the red line has been exceeded over 700 times in one minute. This is quite different from the method used at European level. (...) However, these alarming exceedance levels exist. All the public administrations in Romania must understand that they must implement their plans of action for the improvement of air quality. In the case of Bucharest, which has been referred to court by the European Commission and where we can do absolutely nothing but wait for the ruling, almost none of the measures included in the plan have been implemented. Had we put those measures into practice, the exceedance levels would have been far lower," said Alexe.
The EnviMin emphasized that in 2013 there had been 24 days when the Air Quality Monitoring Station at the National Military Circle had registered the exceedance of the pollution standards, while in 2018 there had been 70 such days.
"Regrettably, I want to emphasize that such exceedances are increasingly higher from one year to another. Most frequently they point the finger at the Ministry of the Environment as the one that should solve the issue of pollution in Romania. There is nothing more false. The Environment Ministry is the one that can control the pollution in a capital city. Through the plans regarding air quality and the management thereof, the Environment Ministry can only approve certain measures, inform the local administrative units, the mayor's offices about these exceedances, for them to take the necessary measures," Alexe explained.
Minister of the Environment, Waters and Forests Costel Alexe was on a visit Monday afternoon to the Air Quality Monitoring Station at the Bucharest National Military Circle, as a result of information circulated in the public space regarding the poor air quality in Bucharest.
