Environment: from ENEA an operative system to fight against pollution

Among the tools deployed to fight pollution, ENEA is providing the Public Administrations with hourly maps of pollutants concentrations to assess the effectiveness and costs of anti-pollution measures. The city of Rome shows also a high degree of urban soil contamination: focus of the project Urbesoil

In its fight against pollution, ENEA has developed for the Ministry of the Environment a modelling system simulating the behavior of pollutants in the atmosphere, allowing to draw hourly maps of pollutants concentrations, particularly of the notorious light dusts. It’s MINNI, an operative tool provided to the Public Administrations in order to assess effectiveness and costs of both short-term emergency measures and long-term structural solutions.

MINNI is composed of two interconnected systems: a modelling system to describe chemical-physical processes in the atmosphere and concentrations of pollutants based on the meteorological conditions and an analysis tool, “Gains-Italy”, capable of assessing impacts and costs of pollution reduction measures.

“MINNI is a powerful tool – points out Gabriele Zanini, Head of the Division “Models and Technologies for the Reduction of Anthropogenic Impacts and Natural Risks”- It tells us the nature of the air pollution phenomenon and when and why it occurs. It also assesses the impact of the interventions, such as the investments in measures to reduce ammonia emissions from agriculture, also contributing to the reduction of the air particulate in the Pianura Padana.”

The anti-pollution system developed by ENEA highlights the importance of introducing “new generation stoves and particulate filters when burning wood for domestic heating and the need to upgrade the energy efficiency of the building stock in order to reduce fossil fuels consumption. As for the transport sector, the use of less polluting vehicles is certainly important but even more so is to decrease the number of circulating cars and make a modal shift from road towards rail transportation of both goods and people.”

But the concentration of micropollutants is getting higher in the air and in the soil as well.  It emerges from a study on urban pollution conducted by ENEA in collaboration with the University of Novi Sad (Serbia). It’s the project Urbesoil, which has shown in Rome an increase in particles pollution from traffic emissions 20 years since the introduction of catalytic converters.

Although these devices have proved effective in eliminating lead from emissions, there has been a constant increase in new micropollutants, particularly of rare earths, usually found in the coating of catalytic converters and of heavy metals such as platinum and palladium, used in converters to accelerate chemical reactions.

“Besides  the distribution of chemical elements-ENEA researcher Massimo Angelone points out-our investigation concerned the mobility of pollutants from the soil or the asphalt pavement.”

The studies on mobility are a fundamental tool to better understand environmental dynamics and determine the best measures to control and reduce pollution, unfortunately not yet incorporated into the current environmental legislation.

The project Urbesoil has stressed the importance of adopting pollution prevention measures, particularly in the absence of precipitation, as is currently the case. “Simple solutions like washing streets and cleaning gutters- Massimo Angelone says- would make it possible to reduce pollutants from the soil and their mobility in the atmosphere, making anti-pollution programs more effective.”

According to the Global Risks Report 2016, released by the World Economic Forum, the world’s awareness of the global environmental crisis has never been more intense. And not just because of the damage to the environment.

The emission of toxic chemicals is a major source of air and soil pollution to which people are particularly exposed – also because the particles, typically in the size range of microns, can be easily inhaled, swallowed or absorbed through the skin. There’s also additional data to provide further evidence of an impending  environmental crisis .

Findings from a recent study by the European Environmental Agency (EEA) show that Italy recorded over 84thousand premature deaths due to air pollution in 2012 (17% of all deaths attributed to air pollution in Europe), of which 70% due to light dusts, 26% to nitrogen oxide and 4% to ozone.

Furthermore, the report “Economic cost of the health impact of air pollution in Europe” developed by the World Health Organization (WHO), together with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), suggests that in Europe in 2015 one out of 4 people got ill or died due to environmental pollution.

For more information please contact:

Gabriele Zanini, Bologna Research Center,  gabriele.zanini@enea.it (Project MINNI)

Luisella Ciancarella, Bologna Research Center, luisella.ciancarella@enea.it (Project MINNI)

Massimo Angelone, Casaccia Research Center, massimo.angelone@enea.it (Project Urbesoil)