Executive Summary

The Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR) in conjunction with The Scottish Office and The Welsh Office has issued guidance under the 1995 Environment Act on the approaches that can be adopted to help identify areas within their locality at risk of exceeding the objectives prescribed in the Air Quality Regulations, 1997. The Government has recently published proposals to amend the National Air Quality Strategy: these proposals include an amendment of the air quality objective for PM₁₀. The proposed new objectives for PM₁₀for 31 December 2004 are:

• an annual objective of 40 mg m-3;
  
• a 24 hour objective of 50 mg m-3 with a maximum of 35 exceedences (approximately 90 th percentile of 50 mg m-3).
  

The Government commissioned AEA Technology, Stanger Science and Environment and Air Quality Consultants to prepare informal technical information for local authorities on the approaches that they might take to help identify areas within their locality at risk of exceeding these new objectives for PM₁₀.

This report summarises some research carried out using dispersion models and the development of new maps of estimated background PM₁₀concentrations in support of the development of this technical information for Local Authorities on the review and assessment of PM₁₀. The research covered:

• the development of a simple screening tool for the assessment of emissions of particles from domestic coal burning;
  
• the development of screening tools for the assessment of industrial stack emissions;
  
• maps of estimated secondary PM₁₀for 1996 and total PM₁₀for 2004
  

and is described in this report.

Introduction

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Report and site prepared by the National Environmental Technology Centre, part of AEA Technology, on behalf of the UK Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions