'Bringing Airparif's air
quality information into the EEA's In Your
Neighbourhood project would be highly valuable
and could spearhead similar cooperation for
the Agency elsewhere in Europe' says EEA Executive
Director Prof. Jacqueline McGlade as representatives
from the regional French air monitoring body
met with EEA management today to discuss potential
future cooperation.
Airparif is in charge of air quality monitoring
in and around Paris and has made a considerable
effort to make its information publicly available
through the web. Prof. Jacqueline McGlade
says that Airparif's public information service
is among the very best of its kind in Europe.
Partly for this reason, Airparif is seen as
an excellent partner for the EEA in connection
with the Agency's growing In Your Neighbourhood
project, that will enable people to find information
about their local environment through a map-based
internet service.
Airparif director Philippe Lameloise confirms
that though the concrete details need to be
fleshed out, the organisation is very positive
about developing such an information-sharing
cooperation with the EEA.
See for more information on air quality monitoring
in and around Paris:
http://www.airparif.asso.fr/
Airparif presented their air quality information
system at a workshop on real time air pollution
data exchange and forecast in Europe held
on 7-8 April 2005 (at EEA). This successful
first joint EEA/EUMETNET workshop attracted
about 50 participants, from National Meteorological
Services (NMSs), National Environmental Agencies
(NEAs), the European Environment Agency (EEA)
and its European Topic Centre on Air and Climate
Change (ETC/ACC), the European Commission
(DG Environment and JRC), EUMETNET (Working
group on environment), GEMS (Global Earth-system
Monitoring using Space and in-situ data),PROMOTE
(PROtocol MOniToring for the GMES Service
Element) and various regional/local organisations.
Also the US Environmental protection agency
(US EPA) participated.
The workshop agreed on the the need for improved
up-to-date information on air pollution for
the public and for data exchange on real time
monitoring and forecasting at the European
level. EUMETNET and EEA will jointly prepare
a proposal for a plan for a European real
time and forecasting information network,
incorporating the main conclusions from the
workshop and building on existing systems.
For EEA this is a key part of the "in
your neighbourhood project". A next joint
workshop is proposed to be held in autumn
2006. See for more information on the outcomes
of the workshop and further background information
as well as all presentations:
http://air-climate.eionet.eu.int
