After two decades, air quality in England has improved hugely. But…

New research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies praises the ‘remarkable progress’ that the UK has made in reducing PM2.5 levels over the last 20 years but warns that inequalities in exposure to poor air quality still exist.

The report takes a detailed look at the areas in which air quality – specifically PM2.5 levels – has improved over the last two decades, geographically and socio-economically.

The most obvious take-away is the dramatic improvement the country has seen in that time. In 2003 almost everyone suffered from PM2.5 levels over 10µg/m³ whereas today, almost no-one does.

Interestingly, this was not a gradual improvement. Air quality improved dramatically between 2003 and 2007 and another significant improvement was seen as the country came out of lockdown in 2020 with air quality failing to return to pre-Covid levels.

Geographically, the fall in exposure to PM2.5 is relatively consistent. The smallest improvement is in the North East, where people are subjected to 47% less PM2.5 exposure than 20 years ago, the biggest drop in exposure being 56% in the South East. 

The IFS break down geographical regions into lower layer super output areas (LSOA), the size of which varies according to population density, but they tend to be made up of between 400 and 1,200 households.

To determine how different sections of society are affected, the LSOAs are divided into five categories using their 2019 income deprivation rank – the last year for which such data is available.  The average exposure to PM2.5 in each of these quintiles was then examined.

Unsurprisingly, lower-income neighbourhoods have persistently higher levels of air pollution than the better off areas although, in terms of the greatest exposure to PM2.5, the two most deprived quintiles (the 4th and 5th poorest neighbourhoods) tended to have swapped places over the course of the 20 years. 

In 2023, residents of the most deprived areas experienced 8% higher average PM2.5 concentrations than those in the least deprived.

In 2003,  ethnic minorities were exposed to levels of air pollution 13% higher than those for white populations in 2003. This figure has now fallen to 6% but not necessarily because the air in those neighbourhoods has dramatically improved. The IFS’ figures show that much of this change is due to ethnic minorities moving away from polluted areas – a factor of greater consequence than falls in the levels of air pollution:

‘In other words, even if air pollution had not fallen at all, the gap in air pollution exposure between white people and ethnic minorities would still have halved because people of ethnic minorities have moved to less polluted areas. Since the pandemic, however, falling air pollution has been a more important channel than ethnic minorities moving to different areas.’

Bobbie Upton, Research Economist at IFS and an author of the report, said: ‘There is growing evidence that fine particulate air pollution is extremely damaging for health, particularly for children and the elderly. It is hard to fully explain the striking drop in air pollution that started in 2020, during the COVID pandemic. New clean air zones in several of England’s largest cities and reduced steel production may have both played a role. It is important for the nation’s health, and for reducing health inequalities, that progress continues to be made on reducing air pollution. The good news for government is that there are policies, such as supporting research and innovation in electrifying steel production, that both move towards net zero and reduce air pollution.’

A full copy of the research can be found here.

Photo: Louise Thomas