Cleaner air for Europe: EU efforts to fight air pollution

Air pollution knows no borders. Wind can carry pollutants over thousands of kilometres. Poor air quality impacts negatively on human health, ecosystems, crop yields and buildings. It is one of the main environmental causes of premature death, having claimed 5.5m lives globally and over 430,000 in the EU in 2013.

The European Commission estimates the cost of air pollution linked to the degradation of health in European society to amount to €330bn to €940bn per year.

Developed since 1970 in the wake of acid rain fall that had been destroying European forests and polluting freshwaters, EU air quality policy, in combination with technological change, has contributed to reducing air pollution substantially.

Author: Aleksandra Heflich

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