Environment Ministry: Bucharest’s integrated plan for air quality, approved by end-July

Anca Alexe 18/05/2018 | 08:23

The Environment Ministry released a statement on Thursday saying that the integrated plan for air quality in Bucharest is due to be approved by the end of July, as local authorities have managed to complete the document according to the planned timeline.

The announcement came just a few hours after the European Commission had announced that it will send Romania, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and the UK to the European Court of Justice for excessive air pollution and for not adopting the appropriate measures for shortening the periods when the pollution values exceed the maximum limits by as much as possible.

In all cases of exceeding EU-imposed limits regarding air quality, member states must adopt plans for air quality improvement and ensure that they establish appropriate measures to reduce pollution by as much as possible.

Environment minister Gratiela Gavrilescu met with the mayors of the three urban areas subject to infringement procedures by the EC (Brasov, Iasi and Bucharest), in order to discuss their plans for improving air quality. She also met with leaders of other areas and had three meetings with European commissioner Karmenu Vella on the subject, according to the Ministry’s statement.

The ministry also notes that one of the measures it has taken for reducing the impact of traffic on air quality was to continue the Rabla and Rabla Plus programmes and allocating large sums in order to promote the purchase of new cars which are less polluting.