The second year in a row that Madrid improves air pollution data and manages to meet European limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO₂), and the second year that Mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida raises the alarm. “We start 2024 with great news: Madrid has a different air, cleaner, healthier. “Madrid is today a role model for Europe,” triumphed Almeida in a press release issued by the city council on Tuesday. After years of non-compliance that led to the EU condemning Spain for poor results in Madrid and Barcelona, there was still a NO₂ black point in the capital: the Plaza Elíptica. In 2022, this observatory remained at 40 micrograms per cubic meter (µg/m³), exactly the limit set by the European Union (EU) in its 2008 directive. In 2023 the value was reduced to 36 μg/m3. Ecologists in Action is pleased to see “real and clearer” data, but reminds the mayor that he is ignoring that the numbers for other pollutants with legal limits, such as tropospheric ozone, the so-called bad ozone, “are the worst since 2015 .” ” “Overall, the data for 2023 is much worse than what we have seen, exacerbated by climate change,” says one of its spokespersons, Juan Bárcena.
In the note, the mayor claims that 2023 will see “the best air quality records” in the historic series, reducing NO₂ levels “to historic lows” and “maintaining a balance between economic growth and environmental protection.” “We have shown Europe that our strategy against pollution and air quality is a success. “The effectiveness of Madrid 360 is undeniable,” says the city council happily, noting that “the previous measures were simply ineffective,” referring to Madrid Central, which he promised to abolish in his first mayoral election campaign. For Bárcena, however, “the great merit” of Almeida is precisely “not respecting his program and not polluting the center of Madrid”, although she has made it looser “by allowing the entry of 50,000 more polluting cars into the central almond allowed”. “.
Comparison table between 2018 and 2023 of the annual averages in the 24 air quality stations of Madrid. MADRID CITY COUNCIL
“Today we can proudly say that we have reversed this situation.” [en referencia a la condena a España de 2022 por los incumplimientos reiterados de la normativa comunitaria] Thanks to our ecological sustainability strategy “Madrid 360”, Almeida explains what Bárcena answers with the data at hand: “The real and big turning point was in 2019 with the entry into force of Madrid Central.” The air quality expert from Ecologistas recalls: “If you look at the evolution of the data Since 2010, when the limits have been in effect, the number of stations that have exceeded them ranged from 18 of the 24 available, the worst value, to six. with an average of 11. The big jump came with Madrid Central in 2019, when non-compliant stations dropped to two.”
However, the figures presented by the city council “make cheap comparisons by using 2018 as a base year – the PP came back to power in the capital in June 2018 – and ignoring 2019.” In its note, the city council highlights that the Plaza Elíptica has decreased by an average of 32% since 2018 and by 11% compared to 2022.
It also states that the stations that lead the largest decrease in nitrogen dioxide “since 2018 thanks to Madrid 360” are Escuelas Aguirre, which did not comply with 55 μg/m3 and is now at 33 (-40%). “Plaza de España station follows in the ranking of the largest declines. In 2018 there were 43 cases of non-compliance and in 2023 there were 28 (-35%). This is followed by Plaza Elíptica, which was the black spot of pollution in the capital until 2022. If in 2018 the board limit was exceeded and 53 were reached, the year ended with 36 (-32.1%),” the city council informs.
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Nitrogen dioxide values per year and measuring station from 2010 to 2023, compiled by Ecologistas en Acción on the municipality's website.
In any case, Ecologistas doesn't care who wins the NO₂ reduction medal, whether this company or the previous one, because “what really matters is that the air quality in Madrid is anything but good.” According to official data from Ecologistas, the will soon conduct its own annual assessment, in 2023 “the threshold for warning the population about tropospheric ozone – 180 μg/m3 for one hour – was exceeded at 12 of the 14 stations. “Measure it” and in total it occurred 59 times ago, compared to 10 in 2022 and zero in 2021 and 2020. “To find a worse value, you have to go back to 2015, when there were 142 exceedances.” “We stick to NO₂, but not tropospheric ozone , which is getting worse and there is no protocol that Valladolid and Paris have,” emphasizes Bárcena.
And the worst thing, in his opinion, is that “we started compliance twelve years too late and exactly at the time when the reference values will change.” Ecologists remind that the World Health Organization (WHO) set the limit already in year in 2021 to 10 μg/m3 NO₂ and the EU is expected to adopt a limit of 20 at the beginning of January. “Only three stations, Casa de Campo, El Pardo and Juan Carlos I, are within these values,” stresses Bárcena, underlining that the EU will ask Spain to “reduce” pollution by half “in about five years.” “The worst thing about complacency is remaining there when the only thing we have achieved is adhering to outdated values,” complains Bárcena.
Table of tropospheric ozone population information threshold exceedances prepared by ecologists. +
“And looking ahead to 2024, the challenge is to continue to improve,” the mayor begins in his statement, without, however, announcing any new measures. In this sense, Ecologistas recalls that Plan A, drawn up by the government of Manuela Carmena and still in force, envisaged Madrid Central as a first step, which would be followed by a drastic reduction of lanes in all the city's arteries. “They took over the Gran Vía, but it stayed there,” says Bárcena, asking the mayor to urgently set a date for the reform of the capital’s other main roads.
As an example of the “effectiveness of Madrid 360”, the city council also highlights that this is the second year in which the anti-pollution protocol has not been applied since its entry into force in 2015, while in 2017 it was activated for 43 days. But as in 2022, meteorology also made a decisive contribution in 2023. Autumn was extremely humid in the Community of Madrid and there was no prolonged anticyclonic situation with thermal inversion and calm, which causes the famous beret of the capital.
What the mayor and environmentalists agree on is the same message of gratitude to the people of Madrid. “Without you, who adopted this policy not only as a norm but as a way of life, this success would not have been possible,” Almeida tells the city’s residents. Bárcena also highlights greater awareness and civility among citizens.
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