Urban air quality in Europe - results of three years of standardised biomonitoring studies

Publication Type

Contribution to conference

Authors

Klumpp, A., Klumpp, G., Ansel, W.

Year of publication

2004

Published in

Urban Air Pollution, Bioindication and Environmental Awareness

Editor

Klumpp, A., Ansel, W., Klumpp, G.

Pubisher

Cuvillier Verlag , Göttingen

ISBN / ISSN / eISSN

3-89873-078-0

Page (from - to)

25-50

Conference name

EuroBionet 2002 Conference on Urban Air Pollution, Bioindication and Environmental Awareness

Conference location

Hohenheim

Conference date

05.11.2002

Keywords

Bioindikation, Luftschadstoff, Umweltqualität

Supported by the LIFE Environment Programme of the European Commission, EuroBionet, the ‘European Network for the Assessment of Air Quality by the Use of Bioindicator Plants’ was implemented in 1999 as a cooperative project of local authorities and scientific institutes in twelve urban agglomerations of eight EU member states. It aimed at using standardised bioindication methods in air quality monitoring and environmental awareness raising. During three years, air quality was assessed by means of accumulative and sensitive bioindicator plants at more than 100 monitoring sites. The experiments provided numerous data on the spatial and temporal distribution of air pollution impacts within the local networks and at the European level.

By the use of tobacco plants, a clear gradient of ozone-induced effects with increasing plant injury levels from the north and northwest of Europe to central and southern regions became evident. The analysis of data on ambient ozone concentrations documented that current threshold and target values for the protection of the vegetation were exceeded in most of the cities. The strongest ozone-induced leaf injuries were observed at sites in Lyon, Barcelona and Hohenheim/Ditzingen, whereas only weak to moderate ozone impact occurred at Edinburgh, Sheffield, Copenhagen, and Düsseldorf. The Tradescantia-Micronucleus-Test for the assessment of mutagenic effects was for the first time successfully tested over such a large geographical extension. Hints on an increased genotoxic potential were found at sites with intense road traffic. Our experiments also demonstrated that the use of the standardised grass cultures allows to detect local hot spots of heavy metal pollution, but also to determine the small-scale distribution of the pollution load and to document even short-term changes of the emission situation. Overall, the impact by sulphur and heavy metals was rated as low to moderate. A comparably high heavy metal load, however, was noticeable in the Spanish cities. A clear distinction was found between levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in curly kale plants exposed at urban sites and at reference sites, respectively. The total PAH amounts were in an intermediate range typical for urban areas. Recommendations concerning further steps towards a Europe-wide establishment of biomonitoring procedures in routine air quality control are presented.