Compliance with the annual NO2 air quality standard in Athens. Required NOx levels and expected health implications

Chaloulakou, A; Mavroidis, I; Gavriil, I

dc.contributor.author	Chaloulakou, A	en
dc.contributor.author	Mavroidis, I	en
dc.contributor.author	Gavriil, I	en
dc.date.accessioned	2014-03-01T01:28:03Z
dc.date.available	2014-03-01T01:28:03Z
dc.date.issued	2008	en
dc.identifier.issn	1352-2310	en
dc.identifier.uri	https://dspace.lib.ntua.gr/xmlui/handle/123456789/18689
dc.subject	Air quality standard	en
dc.subject	Annual NO2 concentrations	en
dc.subject	Dose-response	en
dc.subject	Health effects	en
dc.subject	NO:NO2 ratio	en
dc.subject	NOx reduction	en
dc.subject	Oxidant	en
dc.subject	Urban air pollution	en
dc.subject.classification	Environmental Sciences	en
dc.subject.classification	Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences	en
dc.subject.other	Air quality	en
dc.subject.other	Gas emissions	en
dc.subject.other	Health risks	en
dc.subject.other	Pulmonary diseases	en
dc.subject.other	Risk assessment	en
dc.subject.other	Air quality standards	en
dc.subject.other	Dose-response	en
dc.subject.other	Health effects	en
dc.subject.other	Public health	en
dc.subject.other	Urban air pollution	en
dc.subject.other	Nitrogen oxides	en
dc.subject.other	nitrogen dioxide	en
dc.subject.other	nitrogen oxide	en
dc.subject.other	air quality	en
dc.subject.other	atmospheric pollution	en
dc.subject.other	concentration (composition)	en
dc.subject.other	dose-response relationship	en
dc.subject.other	mortality	en
dc.subject.other	nitrogen dioxide	en
dc.subject.other	public health	en
dc.subject.other	residential location	en
dc.subject.other	respiratory disease	en
dc.subject.other	risk assessment	en
dc.subject.other	standard (reference)	en
dc.subject.other	urban area	en
dc.subject.other	air monitoring	en
dc.subject.other	air pollution	en
dc.subject.other	air quality standard	en
dc.subject.other	article	en
dc.subject.other	cardiovascular disease	en
dc.subject.other	dose response	en
dc.subject.other	Greece	en
dc.subject.other	hospital admission	en
dc.subject.other	human	en
dc.subject.other	policy	en
dc.subject.other	priority journal	en
dc.subject.other	residential area	en
dc.subject.other	respiratory tract disease	en
dc.subject.other	risk assessment	en
dc.subject.other	traffic	en
dc.subject.other	urban area	en
dc.subject.other	Athens [Attica]	en
dc.subject.other	Attica	en
dc.subject.other	Eurasia	en
dc.subject.other	Europe	en
dc.subject.other	Greece	en
dc.subject.other	Southern Europe	en
dc.title	Compliance with the annual NO2 air quality standard in Athens. Required NOx levels and expected health implications	en
heal.type	journalArticle	en
heal.identifier.primary	10.1016/j.atmosenv.2007.09.067	en
heal.identifier.secondary	http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2007.09.067	en
heal.language	English	en
heal.publicationDate	2008	en
heal.abstract	Recent risk assessment studies have shown that high outdoor NO, levels observed in residential areas contribute to increased respiratory and cardiovascular diseases and mortality. Detailed information on present NO2 levels as well as predictions of NO2 concentrations corresponding to reduced NOx levels in urban areas are very useful to decision and policy makers in order to protect the public health. In the present paper, monitoring stations of the Athens network are initially classified into two main groups, traffic affected and urban background, using effectively a criterion based on the ratio of annual mean NO:NO2 concentrations. Two empirical methodologies are then considered and compared for assessing the effect of different NOx levels on the attainment of the annual NO2 air quality standard at urban-background locations in the Athens area. An interesting finding is that these two methodologies, one more general and one both year and site dependent, give similar results for the specific study area and can be applied alternatively based on the length of available concentration time series. The results show that in order to meet the EU annual mean NO2 objective at all the urban-background locations of the Athens area, annual NOx concentrations should be reduced to approximately 60 mu g m(-3), requiring NOx emission reductions of up to 30%. An analysis of the health implications of the currently observed NO, levels is conducted, based on a dose-response relationship, and is coupled with available health-related data for the Athens area. This analysis suggests that if NO2 concentrations were reduced to the levels of the annual EU air quality standard, then a decrease of hospital admissions of up to 2.6% would be observed, depending on the levels of NO2 measured at different monitoring sites of the Athens conurbation. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.	en
heal.publisher	PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD	en
heal.journalName	Atmospheric Environment	en
dc.identifier.doi	10.1016/j.atmosenv.2007.09.067	en
dc.identifier.isi	ISI:000253290300005	en
dc.identifier.volume	42	en
dc.identifier.issue	3	en
dc.identifier.spage	454	en
dc.identifier.epage	465	en