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In February, London Mayor Boris Johnson unveiled what environmentally conscious Londoners have been waiting for; a multimillion pound injection into air quality measures in the capital.

The project will initially assign 6 million pounds of match funding to London boroughs between 2013-2016 and early expectations are that this will increase to 20million over the next 10 years. Hence, the commonly used title of ‘The Mayor’s £20 million Air Quality Fund’.

The London borough of Redbridge has received particularly strong coverage in light of the grants and has been awarded a £100,000 cash injection in the quest for a greener, cleaner borough with school children and locals better educated about the importance of high air quality.

The grant will allow Redbridge to create ‘green walls’ and screens, a method of using vegetation to absorb nitrogen dioxide emissions. The allowance will also allow the borough to plant trees and further educate local residents about harmful emissions and ways they can reduce their carbon footprint.

The grant will fund projects at two of the borough’s schools; however which schools will be chosen is yet to be determined. Aside from Redbridge further London boroughs such as Hackney, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Newham, Braking, Dagenham and Havering have also benefitted from grants and are using these funds to establish a broad range of green initiatives. Examples include cycle schemes, NHS Cleaner Air Projects and ‘Green Action Zones’. In order to be considered for funding, a further 6 boroughs are also working to meet a selection of green criteria, such as reducing vehicle emissions from the council fleet.

So far, so good for UK air quality.

Shortly after the London grants hit the press however, local authority doom and gloom was quickly catching up with any positive news as it emerged that up to 600 air quality monitoring stations in the UK could face closure under proposed government cuts.

The aim is to remove the responsibility of air quality assessments from local authorities leading to a decrease in monitoring. Over a 10 year period DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) estimates that removing this onus from local authorities will save a staggering £50million.

Experts have understandably voiced concerns that budget cuts could undo past air quality improvement measures and severely impact future efforts. After all, how can we really sell the merits of green walls, cycle to work schemes and micro community measures when we don’t understand how they are directly benefiting air quality efforts?  

DEFRA have argued that a high degree of local reporting can act to detract attention away from air quality improvement, but for concerned environmentalists this simply seems like putting the cart before the horse, how can we employ directed measures when monitoring faces cuts?

Contradictions are currently rife, with the press divided between London promises and national air quality monitoring cuts. For now, the consensus is clear, reducing air quality monitoring will be damaging, but will we continue to push on with air quality measures regardless of available data?