Page 5011 - Week 13 - Thursday, 12 November 2009
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Answers to questions
Environment—air quality reports
(Question No 310)
Ms Bresnan asked the Minister for Health, upon notice, on 17 September 2009:
(1) Will the Minister provide measurements for the Monash station with regard to PM10 and PM2.5 as at June 2008 and June 2009 in a format similar to that provided in the ACT 2007 Ambient Air Quality Report, as published by the Environment Protection and Heritage Council and available at http://www.ephc.gov.au/sites/default/files/AAQ_MntRpt__2007_ACT_Report_Final_0.pdf.
(2) What time periods, if any, were measurements at the Monash station of PM10 and PM2.5 found to be invalid, due to problems with measuring equipment.
Ms Gallagher: The answer to the member’s question is as follows:
(1) The Health Protection Service (HPS) operates and maintains instruments that monitor the ACT air for a number of determinants including Particulate Matter less than 10 micrometres Equivalent Aerodynamic Diameter (PM10) and less than 2.5 micrometres Equivalent Aerodynamic Diameter (PM2.5).
The air monitoring data is validated before being transferred to Environment Protection Unit (EPU) of the Department of the Environment, Climate Change, Energy and Water, which prepares the National Environmental Protection Measures (NEPM) report for the ACT. The EPU is currently preparing the 2008 ACT ambient air quality report.
The ACT 2007 Ambient Air Quality Report provides the data in a calendar year format and this format has been followed when providing the requested PM10 and PM2.5 data for years 2008 and 2009.
ACT PM2.5 and PM10 Air Quality Report
PM2.5
Only data classed as valid from the NEPM PM2.5 monitor is used to produce these tables. NEPM standard is 25μg/m3 for 24-hour average, 8μg/m3 for an annual average.
Table 1 - NEPM PM2.5 Monash
|
Year |
Data Availability rates (% of Days) |
Annual Mean Concentration (μg/m3) |
Number of 24-Hour exceedences (days) | ||||
|
Q1 |
Q2 |
Q3 |
Q4 |
Annual | |||
|
2007 |
47.8 |
61.5 |
47.8 |
75.0 |
58.0 |
7.5 |
8 |
|
2008 |
71 |
75 |
55 |
0 |
45 |
8.7 |
6 |
|
2009 |
23 |
45 |
44* |
* |
26 |
7.0 |
1 |
* = Current and further quarter, more data will be available later.
Note: For reporting against the NEPM insufficient data has been collected due to instrument failures or weighing filter occurred outside of strict temperature and relative humidity conditions.
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