On Wednesday, May 17, 2023 at 4:25:18 PM UTC+1, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:
> Whahoo - these successes keep on coming!

Well on course for a complete death by 2030 as the Tories promised in 2019.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fwq8ZfDXwAI_CER?format=jpg&name=medium

swldx...@gmail.com <swldxer1958@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 17, 2023 at 4:25:18 PM UTC+1, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:
>> Whahoo - these successes keep on coming!
>
> Well on course for a complete death by 2030 as the Tories promised in 2019.
>
> https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fwq8ZfDXwAI_CER?format=jpg&name=medium

Now put up a similar graph showing car ownership, which has just risen to a
new high.

--
Spike

Usually when you talk to motorists in a line of traffic - one of the perks of my job - it takes a while to get people willing to engage with a camera crew.

Many drivers unsurprisingly won't wind down the window.

But when it comes to the ULEZ - the Ultra-Low Emission Zone expansion (or ULEX as some have called it) you can gather usually negative opinions very quickly.

ULEZ covers inner London at the moment and vehicles that are not compliant have to pay £12.50 a day to drive within the North and South circulars..

From August, the mayor wants to expand it out to cover the whole of the capital.

This is based on the concept that the "polluter pays" - it's trying to encourage you to switch to a cleaner vehicle or use public transport.

It is a policy some might think doesn't affect that many vehicles in the capital as almost half of households in London don't own a car.

However, car ownership varies across London - from 26% of households in Islington to 75% in Richmond.

Transport for London (TfL) says 85% of vehicles that drive in the zone are already compliant.

It also estimates the expanded ULEZ will affect 200,000 vehicles, although it expects that to drop quickly.

Sadiq Khan wrote to the prime minister on Wednesday, asking for central government funding for a targeted scrappage scheme aimed at helping people retrofit or replace vehicles that are not compliant.

As the commentator Dave Hill from onlondon.co.uk has said, some thought this was a policy whose bark was worse than its bite. Change was already happening as people moved away from older cars anyway.

The polling from YouGov commissioned by City Hall in October 2022 also showed 51% of Londoners asked supported ULEZ while 27% didn't.

Anecdotally, from talking to a line of car drivers, that perhaps doesn't seem to ring true.

Many drivers and outer London residents are furious at the concept that some may have to pay to drive.

There are many lining up against the expanded ULEZ, including councils, motoring groups, City Hall Conservatives and residents.

The policy is now being dissected with arguments over very specific statistics. One example is a line in the official independent assessment report by the firm Jacobs.

It is being seized by opponents like the Conservatives on the London Assembly.

The exact line is here from page 47 where it says the "Proposed Scheme is modelled to result in a minor reduction (-1.3%) in the average exposure of the population of Greater London to NO2 and negligible reductions (-0.1%) in average exposure to PM2.5".

That is enough for opponents to say it will make little difference to air quality.

City Hall has responded by saying it was "important to understand the impact of this policy in absolute terms".

"For example, although NO2 concentration reductions are smaller in percentage terms than for the central London ULEZ, in absolute terms there is a much larger volume of NOx emissions saved equating to 362 tonnes. This is in comparison to the 240 tonnes saving we saw in central London," a spokesperson said.
Illegal levels

Health experts though say away from the detail, what we should be focussing on is there is no safe level of pollution and any level of pollution is potentially harmful. Pollution can cause asthma and serious lung and cardiovascular conditions.

London air pollution levels are frequently found to break both UK legal and World Health Organization (WHO) limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and WHO limits for PM2.5.

World expert on air quality, Prof Frank Kelly from Imperial College London, says expanding ULEZ will improve the health of Londoners.

"There is nowhere in London still that does meet the WHO air quality guidelines so that means everywhere you go the air you are breathing is having some impact on your health," he said.

"Absolutely expanding the ULEZ will benefit health because the ULEZ will lead to an improvement in air quality and traffic emissions and that means air quality will improve and when we see improvements in air quality we see health benefits."

Clean air campaigners want much more than expanding the ULEZ. They want wood burners to be controlled much more and more to be done to reduce other sources of pollution.

Ruth Fitzharris is from the campaign group Mums for Lungs. Her son was recently treated in hospital after suffering an asthma attack aggravated by pollution. She welcomes the expansion of ULEZ.

"Next we need more to bring down the levels of air pollution so that we can actually live and bring up children in a place where the environment is conducive to health and not actually negative impacts on our health," she said.

The politics around the expanded ULEZ have become increasingly toxic and adversarial.

The scheme will face judicial review paid for by council tax payers.

Has the mayor overreached? Should clean air really this be a role for central government and not devolved city mayors?

Health experts are clear it will improve health. Some think ULEZ is going too far, others not far enough.

The questions for London are - how much pollution is acceptable, how fast should the change be and who should bear the cost?

This article raises the question about what is coming next when the
expanded ULEZ ceases to bring in revenue, air quality is found to be very
little affected, and people die in the same numbers as they did before the
zone was implemented. Khan needs income…so where is it to come from?

Also note that some 80% of asthma cases are caused by viral infections.
What is Khan to do about that?

swldx...@gmail.com <swldxer1958@gmail.com> wrote:
> Usually when you talk to motorists in a line of traffic - one of the
> perks of my job - it takes a while to get people willing to engage with a camera crew.
>
> Many drivers unsurprisingly won't wind down the window.
>
> But when it comes to the ULEZ - the Ultra-Low Emission Zone expansion (or
> ULEX as some have called it) you can gather usually negative opinions very quickly.
>
> ULEZ covers inner London at the moment and vehicles that are not
> compliant have to pay £12.50 a day to drive within the North and South circulars.
>
> From August, the mayor wants to expand it out to cover the whole of the capital.
>
> This is based on the concept that the "polluter pays" - it's trying to
> encourage you to switch to a cleaner vehicle or use public transport.
>
> It is a policy some might think doesn't affect that many vehicles in the
> capital as almost half of households in London don't own a car.
>
> However, car ownership varies across London - from 26% of households in
> Islington to 75% in Richmond.
>
> Transport for London (TfL) says 85% of vehicles that drive in the zone
> are already compliant.
>
> It also estimates the expanded ULEZ will affect 200,000 vehicles,
> although it expects that to drop quickly.
>
> Sadiq Khan wrote to the prime minister on Wednesday, asking for central
> government funding for a targeted scrappage scheme aimed at helping
> people retrofit or replace vehicles that are not compliant.
>
> As the commentator Dave Hill from onlondon.co.uk has said, some thought
> this was a policy whose bark was worse than its bite. Change was already
> happening as people moved away from older cars anyway.
>
> The polling from YouGov commissioned by City Hall in October 2022 also
> showed 51% of Londoners asked supported ULEZ while 27% didn't.
>
> Anecdotally, from talking to a line of car drivers, that perhaps doesn't seem to ring true.
>
> Many drivers and outer London residents are furious at the concept that
> some may have to pay to drive.
>
> There are many lining up against the expanded ULEZ, including councils,
> motoring groups, City Hall Conservatives and residents.
>
> The policy is now being dissected with arguments over very specific
> statistics. One example is a line in the official independent assessment
> report by the firm Jacobs.
>
> It is being seized by opponents like the Conservatives on the London Assembly.
>
> The exact line is here from page 47 where it says the "Proposed Scheme is
> modelled to result in a minor reduction (-1.3%) in the average exposure
> of the population of Greater London to NO2 and negligible reductions
> (-0.1%) in average exposure to PM2.5".
>
> That is enough for opponents to say it will make little difference to air quality.
>
> City Hall has responded by saying it was "important to understand the
> impact of this policy in absolute terms".
>
> "For example, although NO2 concentration reductions are smaller in
> percentage terms than for the central London ULEZ, in absolute terms
> there is a much larger volume of NOx emissions saved equating to 362
> tonnes. This is in comparison to the 240 tonnes saving we saw in central
> London," a spokesperson said.
> Illegal levels
>
> Health experts though say away from the detail, what we should be
> focussing on is there is no safe level of pollution and any level of
> pollution is potentially harmful. Pollution can cause asthma and serious
> lung and cardiovascular conditions.
>
> London air pollution levels are frequently found to break both UK legal
> and World Health Organization (WHO) limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2),
> and WHO limits for PM2.5.
>
> World expert on air quality, Prof Frank Kelly from Imperial College
> London, says expanding ULEZ will improve the health of Londoners.
>
> "There is nowhere in London still that does meet the WHO air quality
> guidelines so that means everywhere you go the air you are breathing is
> having some impact on your health," he said.
>
> "Absolutely expanding the ULEZ will benefit health because the ULEZ will
> lead to an improvement in air quality and traffic emissions and that
> means air quality will improve and when we see improvements in air
> quality we see health benefits."
>
> Clean air campaigners want much more than expanding the ULEZ. They want
> wood burners to be controlled much more and more to be done to reduce
> other sources of pollution.
>
> Ruth Fitzharris is from the campaign group Mums for Lungs. Her son was
> recently treated in hospital after suffering an asthma attack aggravated
> by pollution. She welcomes the expansion of ULEZ.
>
> "Next we need more to bring down the levels of air pollution so that we
> can actually live and bring up children in a place where the environment
> is conducive to health and not actually negative impacts on our health," she said.
>
> The politics around the expanded ULEZ have become increasingly toxic and adversarial.
>
> The scheme will face judicial review paid for by council tax payers.
>
> Has the mayor overreached? Should clean air really this be a role for
> central government and not devolved city mayors?
>
> Health experts are clear it will improve health. Some think ULEZ is going
> too far, others not far enough.
>
> The questions for London are - how much pollution is acceptable, how fast
> should the change be and who should bear the cost?
>

--
Spike

The first year of the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) expansion to inner London has achieved a dramatic reduction in emissions and air pollution, and a huge increase in the share of vehicles that meet the ULEZ standards, according to a major new report from City Hall and peer reviewed by Dr Gary Fuller at Imperial College London.

Despite huge progress, the whole of London still exceeds the World Health Organization’s guidelines for air quality, and over half of deaths attributable to air pollution are in outer London.

Around 4,000 Londoners die prematurely every year due to toxic air, and the report published today shows that the Mayor’s air quality policies, in particular the ULEZ and LEZ schemes, are having a transformative impact - cutting the number of older, more polluting vehicles seen driving in London and reducing the levels of harmful air pollution.

The ULEZ was introduced in central London in 2019 and expanded to inner London in October 2021.

The central London ULEZ had a clear impact – in its first 10 months of operation, it helped reduce road transport nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions by 35 per cent and CO2 emissions by 6 percent in the zone.

The landmark report shows that the ULEZ expansion has built on these benefits, with harmful nitrogen dioxide (NO2) levels 46 per cent lower in central London and 21 per cent lower in inner London than they would have been without the scheme.

The number of older, more polluting vehicles in the zone has also continued to reduce significantly, dropping by 60 per cent since the inner London expansion came into operation in October 2021– an average reduction of 74,000 polluting vehicles every day seen driving in the zone. Overall, there were nearly 50,000 fewer vehicles seen in the zone on an average day – a reduction of almost five per cent compared to the month prior to the expansion.

The Mayor announced last November that the ULEZ will be expanded across all London boroughs in August 2023 to help bring the air quality and associated health benefits to the five million people living in outer London.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan said: “The evidence from this landmark report is clear – the ULEZ works. This is beyond dispute. It has already reduced toxic air pollution by almost half in central London and by over a fifth in inner London, transforming the quality of air for four million Londoners. "

“But there’s still more to do. Toxic air is a matter of life and death, with around 4,000 deaths in London attributed to air pollution in 2019. It’s also stunting the growth of children’s lungs and causing people to develop life-changing illnesses, such as cancer, lung disease, dementia and asthma.

Other key findings in the report include harmful nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentrations are revealed to have reduced further than originally predicted, and are estimated to be 21 per cent lower in inner London and 46 per cent lower in central London than they would have been without the ULEZ.

Crucially, NO2 levels have not returned to pre-pandemic levels, indicating that even as traffic levels have risen, cleaner vehicles have had such positive impacts on emissions that air pollution levels continue to be far below what they would have been without the ULEZ and other policies that the Mayor has implemented.

Christina Calderato, TfL’s Director of Strategy and Policy, said: “This report is further clear evidence that the ULEZ is highly effective and does what it is designed to do, protect Londoners’ health and significantly reduce pollution. It is great to see that significant numbers of people have moved away from older, more polluting vehicles and some of the most deadly emissions have been cut by a quarter. With London still exceeding WHO guidelines and those in outer London disproportionately suffering as a result of the capital’s filthy air, there is no stronger case to support the zone covering the whole of the city."

On 22/05/2023 05:55 am, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:
> Usually when you talk to motorists in a line of traffic - one of the perks of my job - it takes a while to get people willing to engage with a camera crew.
>
> Many drivers unsurprisingly won't wind down the window.
>
> But when it comes to the ULEZ - the Ultra-Low Emission Zone expansion (or ULEX as some have called it) you can gather usually negative opinions very quickly.
>
> ULEZ covers inner London at the moment and vehicles that are not compliant have to pay £12.50 a day to drive within the North and South circulars.
>
> From August, the mayor wants to expand it out to cover the whole of the capital.
>
> This is based on the concept that the "polluter pays" - it's trying to encourage you to switch to a cleaner vehicle or use public transport.
>
> It is a policy some might think doesn't affect that many vehicles in the capital as almost half of households in London don't own a car.
>
> However, car ownership varies across London - from 26% of households in Islington to 75% in Richmond.
>
> Transport for London (TfL) says 85% of vehicles that drive in the zone are already compliant.
>
> It also estimates the expanded ULEZ will affect 200,000 vehicles, although it expects that to drop quickly.
>
> Sadiq Khan wrote to the prime minister on Wednesday, asking for central government funding for a targeted scrappage scheme aimed at helping people retrofit or replace vehicles that are not compliant.
>
> As the commentator Dave Hill from onlondon.co.uk has said, some thought this was a policy whose bark was worse than its bite. Change was already happening as people moved away from older cars anyway.
>
> The polling from YouGov commissioned by City Hall in October 2022 also showed 51% of Londoners asked supported ULEZ while 27% didn't.
>
> Anecdotally, from talking to a line of car drivers, that perhaps doesn't seem to ring true.
>
> Many drivers and outer London residents are furious at the concept that some may have to pay to drive.
>
> There are many lining up against the expanded ULEZ, including councils, motoring groups, City Hall Conservatives and residents.
>
> The policy is now being dissected with arguments over very specific statistics. One example is a line in the official independent assessment report by the firm Jacobs.
>
> It is being seized by opponents like the Conservatives on the London Assembly.
>
> The exact line is here from page 47 where it says the "Proposed Scheme is modelled to result in a minor reduction (-1.3%) in the average exposure of the population of Greater London to NO2 and negligible reductions (-0.1%) in average exposure to PM2.5".
>
> That is enough for opponents to say it will make little difference to air quality.
>
> City Hall has responded by saying it was "important to understand the impact of this policy in absolute terms".
>
> "For example, although NO2 concentration reductions are smaller in percentage terms than for the central London ULEZ, in absolute terms there is a much larger volume of NOx emissions saved equating to 362 tonnes. This is in comparison to the 240 tonnes saving we saw in central London," a spokesperson said.
> Illegal levels
>
> Health experts though say away from the detail, what we should be focussing on is there is no safe level of pollution and any level of pollution is potentially harmful. Pollution can cause asthma and serious lung and cardiovascular conditions.
>
> London air pollution levels are frequently found to break both UK legal and World Health Organization (WHO) limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and WHO limits for PM2.5.
>
> World expert on air quality, Prof Frank Kelly from Imperial College London, says expanding ULEZ will improve the health of Londoners.
>
> "There is nowhere in London still that does meet the WHO air quality guidelines so that means everywhere you go the air you are breathing is having some impact on your health," he said.
>
> "Absolutely expanding the ULEZ will benefit health because the ULEZ will lead to an improvement in air quality and traffic emissions and that means air quality will improve and when we see improvements in air quality we see health benefits."
>
> Clean air campaigners want much more than expanding the ULEZ. They want wood burners to be controlled much more and more to be done to reduce other sources of pollution.
>
> Ruth Fitzharris is from the campaign group Mums for Lungs. Her son was recently treated in hospital after suffering an asthma attack aggravated by pollution. She welcomes the expansion of ULEZ.
>
> "Next we need more to bring down the levels of air pollution so that we can actually live and bring up children in a place where the environment is conducive to health and not actually negative impacts on our health," she said.
>
> The politics around the expanded ULEZ have become increasingly toxic and adversarial.
>
> The scheme will face judicial review paid for by council tax payers.
>
> Has the mayor overreached? Should clean air really this be a role for central government and not devolved city mayors?
>
> Health experts are clear it will improve health. Some think ULEZ is going too far, others not far enough.
>
> The questions for London are - how much pollution is acceptable, how fast should the change be and who should bear the cost?

There's a Commons debate on 26th June.

swldx...@gmail.com <swldxer1958@gmail.com> wrote:

> The first year of the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) expansion to inner
> London has achieved a dramatic reduction in emissions and air pollution,
> and a huge increase in the share of vehicles that meet the ULEZ
> standards, according to a major new report from City Hall and peer
> reviewed by Dr Gary Fuller at Imperial College London.

In the usual peer-review process, you don’t know who the reviewer is.

In narrow fields of scientific endeavour, it’s pretty easy to guess, and
tailor your research and report accordingly.

--
Spike

Air pollution is damaging people’s health and cutting lives short. It affects us all – from when we are in the womb through to old age.. But some people are far more vulnerable to toxic air, including children, older people, and people with chronic illnesses. And across Greater London, as in many other places, we’re seeing some people disproportionately exposed to higher levels of air pollution, including people from low income households, people from ethnic minorities, and outdoor and transport workers.

In addition to disproportionate exposure, a study by the University of the West of England found that in the UK people from low income households tend to contribute less to the problem by being less likely to own a car and less likely to use it as often as people on higher incomes.
London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone

The Government’s own research shows that Clean Air Zones (CAZs) are the most effective way to quickly reduce illegal and harmful levels of air pollution in urban areas – a guarantee that they protect people’s health, fast.

London first launched a Low Emission Zone (LEZ) in 2008. This covers the whole of Greater London but crucially only applies to heavy duty vehicles, such as lorries, buses and coaches. It does not affect emissions from cars, which are the biggest source of illegal air pollution in the city, or vans.

In 2014, in response to increasing pressure, including ClientEarth’s first legal challenge against the UK Government for failing to meet legal limits of air pollution, the then Mayor of London proposed an ‘Ultra Low Emission Zone’ (ULEZ) for central London that would apply to all vehicles, including cars, from October 2020.

The ULEZ has subsequently paved the way for CAZs put forward by the UK Government. They work by setting minimum emissions standards and vehicles that do not meet these standards are discouraged from entering the zone by having to pay a charge if they do.

Whilst the initial proposals for the ULEZ were a welcome first step it was clear that a bigger, better ULEZ was needed sooner to ensure that legal limits for air pollution were met in London in the shortest time possible.

Following further legal victories against the UK Government, the current Mayor of London consulted with Londoners and brought forward the implementation of the ULEZ by 17 months. It launched in 2019 and we know it’s already working.

In the first 10 months of the central London scheme, the city saw a significant improvement in the air quality. The number of the most polluting vehicles dropped by 17,396 on average: a reduction of around 49%. Without bold policies like this, it would have taken a whopping 193 years from 2016 for London to meet legal limits for nitrogen dioxide.