Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union

E2: Environmental statistics and accounts; sustainable development

e-mail contact: ESTAT-SDG-MONITORING@ec.europa.eu

Air pollution is one of the biggest environmental health risks, as it can reduce people’s life expectancy and perception of well-being, and can lead to or aggravate many chronic and acute respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. Given its close link to economic activities and road transport, the measures taken by many European countries in face of COVID-19 are expected to affect the concentrations of air pollutions. An overview of the air quality standards set by the European Union can be found in the air quality standards summary table.

Nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) is an air pollutant mainly emitted by road transport. Monthly average NO₂ concentrations are based on hourly measurements from air quality measuring stations in EU capital cities, from which a monthly average for each city is calculated. The EU average is the simple arithmetic mean of the European capital cities.

Concentrations of air pollutants are very dependent on local features, such as emission sources, impact of external sources, or meteorological and topographical conditions. Air quality measurement furthermore tends to be hotspot-oriented and the average of air quality stations of the capital is not the average air quality the population is exposed to, neither of the capital nor of the country.

µg NO₂ per m³

Month

Indicator from non-ESS source. Data are experimental and provisional and neither seasonally nor calendar adjusted. For further assessment of accuracy please refer to the original source (see link to external data source and metadata in section “Annexes”).

European Environment Agency (EEA)

Data source: European Environment Agency (EEA)

Data provider: European Environment Agency (EEA)

Not Applicable

The indicator is updated monthly.

Not Applicable

New data points are disseminated within one month after the reference month.

All EU MS

Data are presented for the capitals of all EU Member States plus the capitals of Iceland, Norway and Switzerland..

All EU MS

Data are comparable between all EU Member States and the other presented countries.

< 5 years

Presented time series (including EU aggregates) starts in 2018.

> 4 data points

Length of comparable time series without methodological break is longer than 4 data points.

The indicator is presented in the European Statistical Recovery Dashboard.

See table env_air_no2

Eurostat's Statistical Recovery Dashboard

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