Abu Dhabi school gets first station to check air quality

Abu Dhabi: The Environment Agency - Abu Dhabi yesterday installed its first fixed Air Quality Monitoring Station at a local school as part of the Abu Dhabi Air Quality Management Project.

The project, under the directives of President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, includes a network of 10 fixed stations and two mobile stations emirate-wide. The installation would be over by the first quarter of 2007.

The installation ceremony at Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan School for Girls in Al Mushrif was attended by Mohammad Saeed Al Kindi, Minister of Environment and Water, Salem Al Daheri, Director-General of the Federal Environment Agency, Mohammad Ahmad Al Bowardi, EAD Managing Director, and Majid Al Mansouri, EAD Secretary General.

The ceremony, held under the patronage of Shaikh Hamdan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and EAD Chairman, was also attended by Shaikh Zayed Bin Hamdan Al Nahyan.

The site for the installation of the first fixed station, according to EAD, was chosen as a representative of a typical residential area in the city.

It is part the third phase of the Abu Dhabi Air Quality Management Project, which EAD has implemented since 2003 in cooperation with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), Abu Dhabi Water and Electricity Authority (Adwea), and the Abu Dhabi and Al Ain municipalities. Abu Dhabi Police is also a partner in the project as they provide essential data about traffic counts, vehicle age and distribution.

Al Mansouri said: "While we are witnessing rapid industrial and tourism development around us in the emirate, I would like to assure the public that we are using the best technology available to monitor the air we breathe here in Abu Dhabi to ensure that it is clean by minimising the percentage of pollutants such as oxides of nitrogen, oxides of sulfur, particulate matter and ozone."

Dr Jabir Al Jabiri, Director of Environment Protection Department at EAD, said the stations are being set up at a cost of Dh20 million. They include 10 fixed stations in Abu Dhabi and Al Ain and two mobile stations for services like checking air pollution at industrial units in the emirate.

About the coverage area of the fixed stations, Al Jabiri said each one covers an area of 25km to 30km radius. "All the stations would be centrally interlinked for data collection. In addition to these 12 stations from EAD, our partners, such as Abu Dhabi and Al Ain municipalities, Adwea and Adnoc, are establishing similar stations. All these stations would be inter-linked," he said.

Locations

Al Jabiri said the main station would be installed at the traffic junction at Hamdan and Salam Streets. He said the city centre would have three fixed stations in addition to availability of mobile stations whenever necessary.

He said air quality standard of World Health Organisation (WHO) would be used. "We have compared many air quality standards such as [that of] the European Union, but found the WHO standard more suitable."

The project would assist EAD in continuous monitoring of air quality, ensuring that it doesn't violate international standards and setting regulations and strategies to prevent worsening of the situation.

The fourth and final phase of the Air Quality Management Project comprises the continuous operation of the system.