• Environment.Madrid activates the protocol for high contamination

  • Environment: The coronavirus causes a historic decrease in pollution in Madrid

Just in one of the moments with

less traffic in the streets of Madrid

, the City Council was forced yesterday to activate scenario 1 of the Anti-Pollution Protocol.

This measure obliges to limit the speed of vehicles to 70 kilometers per hour on the M-30 and on the access roads inside the M-40, during the day yesterday and today, Monday. after the air quality monitoring stations of Ramón y Cajal, Plaza de Cast

illa, Cuatro Caminos and the Pilar neighborhood

180 micrograms / m3 of nitrogen dioxide are exceeded

(NO2) How is it possible that pollution has increased so much when much of it

of Madrid cars are parked

Because of the consequences of Filomena? It is precisely the hangover of the storm that has brought us this increase in pollution.

The meteorological circumstances that have led to the activation of the protocol are unprecedented in Madrid.

The storm has given way to

extremely low temperatures in our city

. «The absence of wind and the layer of snow that we still have prevents the air in contact with the ground from heating up and, therefore,

thermal inversion in the lower layers

it persists throughout the day, causing the accumulation of contamination ", they assure from the Delegation of Environment.

Thermal inversion

And what is thermal inversion?

The air is constantly moving and the layers that form it are usually ordered by their temperature, with the coldest ones circulating in the upper part of the atmosphere and

the hottest, down

However, now, with the arrival of Filomena, this cycle of movement has stopped and

a layer of cold air that remains motionless

above the ground and prevents atmospheric circulation.

When the inversion of heat immobilizes the lower layers, suspended pollutants are trapped and the population is exposed to breathe more polluted air.

Thermal inversion

it is also colder on the plateaus and in the valleys than in the mountains.

In fact, last week there were differences

up to twenty degrees

between the north and south of the region, as happened when in Villamanrique de Tajo there was a temperature of seven degrees below zero compared to 13 degrees in Miraflores de la Sierra. Paradoxically, these bad data for 2021 contrast with those of last year when the The city had the best air quality indices in the last decade.

The arrival of the pandemic caused traffic to drop by 22% and the capital to comply for once the parameters set by the European Union, which was constantly skipping.

Public transport

The Madrid City Council recommends the use of public transport, as established by the protocol, knowing the current limitations as a result of the effects of the storm. In fact, the mayor of the city, José Luis Martínez Almeida, has asked the citizens

that they do not use their vehicles

at the beginning of this week to be able to undertake the work of cleaning the streets after the great snowfall and to recover normality in the city as soon as possible.To facilitate transport, Almeida has announced that for the first time the service of the buses of the Municipal Transport Company (EMT)

will be free

Until next Wednesday. At the moment, there are 96 EMT lines that were operational yesterday and today the service will be extended to new lines, as reported by the City Council.

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