Doubts raised about Defra’s new plan to improve air quality

The Government’s new air quality plan proposes restrictions on certain vehicle types in a handful of cities to accelerate compliance with the European Air Quality Directive. Yet the compliance dates are highly dependent on real world emissions from new diesel cars and vans living up to their test cycle results.

Andrew Forster

30 October 2015

Defra’s predicted compliance dates depend heavily on reduced emissions from diesel cars

Defra’s predicted compliance dates with the annual NO2 limit value for each of the UK’s 43 zones

Consultation closes next week on the Government’s new plan to improve UK air quality and accelerate compliance with the European Air Quality Directive limit values for nitrogen dioxide (LTT 18 Sep). In April, the UK Supreme Court ordered the Government to submit revised plans to the European Commission by the end of December explaining how the period of exceedance of the Directive’s limit values for NO2 would be kept “as short as possible” (LTT 01 May). The new plan says...