The air quality in most of southern Taiwan was worse last year than in 2016 as the average density of fine particulate matter exceeded twice the acceptable level in certain areas, Air Clean Taiwan (ACT) said in a report released on Wednesday.
At 24 of the 76 monitoring stations across Taiwan, the average density of airborne particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometers (PM2.5) last year showed an increase from the previous year, the organization said in its report, which it presented at a news conference held in front of the Legislative Yuan in Taipei.
Most of the 24 stations were in Kaohsiung and in Pingtung County, where PM2.5 levels already far exceeded acceptable limits, ACT said.
In Kaohsiung’s Zuoying District (左營) the annual average PM2.5 density last year was 40.1 micrograms per cubic meter, far exceeding the WHO’s recommended annual mean of 12 micrograms per cubic meter, and more than twice the local guideline of 15 micrograms per cubic meter, ACT director Yeh Guang-peng (葉光芃) said.
He said PM2.5 levels in Zuoying soared to more than 70 micrograms per cubic meter for 661 hours last year, triggering “purple” alerts, the highest on Taiwan’s four-color coded air quality scale.
In comparison, Keelungan recorded PM2.5 purple alerts for only 2 hours last year, Yeh said.
In terms of daily levels of PM2.5, Kaohsiung exceeded the WHO’s recommended highest daily mean concentration of 25 micrograms per cubic meter for 57 percent of last year, Yeh said.
Tainan recorded daily levels in excess of the WHO standard for 51 percent of last year, Yeh added.
In general, air pollution in southern Taiwan was a lot worse than in the north, Yeh said.
Other places in Kaohsiung where the monitoring stations recorded higher pollution levels were Siaogang (小港), Cianjhen (前鎮), Renwu (仁武), Nanzi (楠梓), Qiaotou (橋頭) and Meinong (美濃) districts and Fusing Road, the report said.
Pingtung County, Hengchun Township (恆春), Pingtung City and Chaozhou Township (潮州) showed increases as well as in Mailiao (麥寮) and Taixi (臺西) townships in Yunlin County, it said.
In addition, greater levels of pollution were recorded at stations in Yonghe (永和), Sijhih (汐止), Linkou (林口), and Wanli (萬里) districts in New Taipei City; Jhudong Township (竹東) in Hsinchu County; Puli (埔里) and Jhushan (竹山) townships in Nantou County; Guanshan Township (關山) in Taitung County; and in Hualien, Kinmen and Penghu counties, the report said.
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