Something in the Air (Air Pollution in Ireland) EE19 EP7

Dr Lara Dungan examines the legacy of the ‘Dieselgate’ emissions cheating scandal, 6 years on. She’ll cover the latest health impacts and some of the solutions to traffic related air pollution in Ireland.
“Dieselgate”, the emissions scandal that broke in 2015 brought air pollution to the forefront of public conversation. 6 years on there are over 51 million dirty diesel cars still on our roads that emit 3 or more times the legal limit of harmful nitrogen dioxide. To this day, car manufacturers continue to exploit legal loopholes to defeat new stricter European emissions tests. So today, we are living with the poisonous legacy of old and new diesels on our lives, the consequences although we cannot see them, are deadly.

Each year 1,200 people die as a result of poor air quality, tragically these deaths are entirely preventable. While transport emissions are one of the leading causes of air pollution in Ireland, roadside monitoring of these emissions appears to be sparse. Has legislation caught up with medical research? In this episode, Dr Lara Dungan unpicks the damaging legacy of the Dieselgate scandal, she covers the latest research on the negative health impacts of air pollution and joins communities fighting to restrict car access in our cities.

[@enriquedominguez3963]

Great work on your report about pollution. My city Denver was one of the most polluted cities in America this year, due to the smoke coming from the wildfires in most of the western states. Keep making more reports like this one.

[@robinhood4640]

And we still don't know why so many people's immune system can't cope with a common cold.