If you live in Dublin and have ever wondered how to check the quality of the air you breathe, or the noise levels in your area, a new website has the answer.
Dublin City Council has launched www.dublincityairandnoise.ie to provide real time continuous public access to its air quality and sound level monitoring network.
The site provides access to six stations set up by Dublin City Council to monitor local air quality conditions, as well as the network of eight air quality monitoring stations operated by the Council in cooperation with the Environmental Protection Agency that are part of the national air quality monitoring network.
According to Martin Fitzpatrick, Principal Environmental Health Officer with the Air Quality Monitoring and Noise Control Unit “Our citizens and their public representatives have been looking for some time for credible, readily accessible and real time information on the air quality across their city, and this new website is an important milestone for Dublin City Council in meeting that need.”
The air pollutants monitored include a number of gases such as nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, and carbon monoxide as well as very fine dust particles. All of these pollutants are of concern from a human health perspective so the website also provides information on the National Air Quality Index for Health.
The website also provides access to 13 sound level monitoring stations that are placed in locations across the city that are of value to the community or give a good indication of ambient sound levels within that general area.
The launch of the website comes in the weeks after Dublin became the first Irish city to sign up to the global BreatheLife campaign, a commitment to meet WHO air quality guideline values by 2030.
