A PM2.5 monitoring station at Taipei 101 is to allow environmental officials to measure air quality at higher elevations, improving accuracy, the Taipei Department of Environmental Protection said on Monday.
The department announced the installation of PM2.5 meters on various floors at Taipei 101, which it said would help the department to better track air pollution.
PM2.5 is an indicator of airborne particles measuring 2.5 micrometers or less.
The devices comprise the first long-range vertical pollution-index monitor in the nation and will help officials measure smog from northern China and other air quality phenomena, the department said.
Department division head Yan Ling-chen (顏伶珍) said the issue of air quality has been of growing concern, particularly after it was found that 42 percent of PM2.5 material in Taipei comes from outside Taiwan.
The impact from China has been especially large, Yan said, adding that smog from northern China reaches Taiwan by way of seasonal winds in the autumn and winter.
The remainder of the pollution comes from local manufacturing and transportation, Yan said.
“Taipei has 15 PM2.5 monitoring stations in places like schools and offices, testing levels up to an elevation of 15m — sufficient to understand air quality that affects our daily lives,” Yan said.
“The meters at Taipei 101 will help us take preventive measures by providing data from many more altitudes,” Yan said.
“The data from the sixth floor — at an elevation of 40m — gives information about traffic-related pollution,” Yan said.
On the 50th floor (220m), higher-concentration readings are generally detected — particularly in winter — as the weather at that elevation is more stable and particles do not propogate as easily, while data from the 90th floor (390m) provides information related to pollution from outside of Taiwan, Yan said.
Department Commissioner Liou Ming-lone (劉銘龍) said that on a trip to Japan last year he learned about a similar monitoring system being used at Tokyo Tower, which has meters up to an elevation of 250m, adding that he hopes Taiwan and Japan can collaborate on data collected at Taipei 101 and Tokyo Tower.
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