Wednesday, February 10, 2010

August 23, 2009 14:45 PM

Air Pollution Index Reliable, Says Uggah

SHAH ALAM, Aug 23 (Bernama) -- Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Douglas Uggah Embas has come to the defence of the Department of Environment (DoE), saying its Air Pollution Index (API) readings were reliable and that the DoE had nothing to hide.

The API readings, posted twice daily on the DoE's website, were determined by sophisticated equipment and were recognised internationally, he said when dismissing doubts expressed over the validity of the readings.

"The readings are considered real-time and we have a formula to determine the average. We have automatic continuous air monitoring stations nationwide which are designed to measure the air quality and record air quality data continuously 24 by seven," Uggah told Bernama.

Uggah was responding to a report on the Malaysiakini news portal recently citing Consumers Association of Subang and Shah Alam (CASSA) president Datuk Dr Jacob George as saying that the API statistics were no longer reliable as a tool to inform the public of how bad the air pollution level was.

George was quoted as saying that the public had lost confidence in the API readings as they always showed the air condition to be at a "moderate or good" stage.

"I just do not understand the need for secrecy of the API. What is there to hide from the public? Malaysians will appreciate DoE telling them the real situation," he was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile, Alam Sekitar Malaysia Sdn Bhd (ASMA) chief executive officer Dr Abdul Rani Abdullah Baginda said the API was calculated on an hourly basis and based on a scale of 0 to 500.

"The hourly values are averaged over, among others, 24-hour running period for particulate matter and sulphur dioxide and eight-hour period for carbon monoxide," he said.

Dr Abdul Rani said there were 51 continuous air quality monitoring stations nationwide.

"The stations measure concentrations of five major pollutants for which recommended guidelines have been established, namely particulate matter, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide and ozone," he said, adding that the stations were equipped with meteorological parameters such as wind speed and temperature.

--BERNAMA

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