Villavicencio Adriana Rodríguez, Director of Programs and Strategic Projects of the Ministry of Environment and Territorial Development ( Semadet ), said next year the department will seek the budget for air quality monitoring devices in their areas of concern.
“We have identified medium-sized cities that have significant emissions, Ocotlan, Puerto Vallarta and Ciudad Guzmán, those are our targeted area,” the official said.
Next year’s plan would be to finance mobile units to monitor several areas, including Puerto Vallarta. However the official would not rule out permanent Air Quality Monitoring Networks in 2016 for areas that may show concern with mobile testing.
Guadalajara is the only city in the State of Jalisco with a permanent air quality monitoring system.
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Mobile Monitoring differs from fixed air monitoring stations, in that mobile monitoring can be used to focus on locations with specific air quality issues, roam city-wide or determine local air quality conditions such as near traffic intersections. Mobile monitoring samples at “street level” reflects exposures of individuals to air pollutants at ground level. The mobile sampling can be used to focus on locations with specific issues or to determine representative local air quality conditions (e.g., at traffic intersections) which are common issues in numerous areas across this and other cities. Recent mobile monitoring studies from around the world have shown that the short-term, peak exposures that are experienced near air emission sources can have serious detrimental health impacts in some individuals.
Breathing polluted air can make your eyes and nose burn. It can irritate your throat and make breathing difficult. In fact, pollutants like tiny airborne particles and ground level ozone can trigger respiratory problems, especially for people with asthma. Asthma sufferers can be severely affected by air pollution. Air pollution can also aggravate health problems for the elderly and others with heart or respiratory diseases.
Some toxic chemicals released in the air such as benzene or vinyl chloride are highly toxic and can cause cancer, birth defects, long term injury to the lungs, as well as brain and nerve damage. And in some cases, breathing these chemicals can even cause death.