topic: | Air Pollution |
---|---|
located: | Uganda |
editor: | Bob Koigi |
As the world industrialises, economies grow, and countries embrace modern technologies, nature has suffered the consequences of man-made activities, with pollution reaching epidemic proportions.
Activities such as burning solid fuels, agricultural ventures, mining, wildfires, and expanding infrastructure continue exacerbating the climate crisis, harming the environment, and affecting the population's health.
Air pollution, for example, is at its worst, with an estimated 4.2 million people globally dying each year.
The situation is worse in developing countries. In Africa, up to 1.1 million premature deaths have been associated with air pollution.
Rapid industrialisation in most African cities, transport congestion, mechanised agriculture, and an over-reliance on fuelwood for household energy have fanned the air pollution catastrophe.
In fact, South Africa, Egypt, and Nigeria are Africa’s most polluted countries in terms of air pollution and disease burden. This has had dire health consequences for the continent's people while fuelling the adverse impacts of climate change.
Reports show that Africa is a hotspot of some of the highest concentrations of Sulphur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide, toxic chemicals associated with thermal power plants which have been linked to life-threatening diseases such as cancer, heart diseases, stroke and acute lower respiratory infections.
While Africa has taken steps to monitor pollution levels, the lack of the right air quality monitoring systems has meant that the continent is not accurately measuring pollution levels as it should and is not implementing the right interventions to tame the menace.
Yet, as Uganda has demonstrated, modern technology can be a panacea for the catastrophe.
A team of researchers led by Engineer Bainomugisha has developed a locally made pollution monitoring technology that predicts pollution patterns. The air monitoring sensors are installed on top of buildings and behind motorbike taxis to collect pollution data across the country’s capital, Kampala. The researchers then use cloud-based software to review air particle information in real-time and predict pollution levels.
The government, policymakers, and the private sector then use this information to inform interventions such as clean-air pollution campaigns and health policies.
The technology, dubbed AirQo, has been designed for Africa. It can withstand rough terrain and can be installed in areas that are not connected to the grid because it uses solar energy.
As the world commemorates Earth Day this month, focusing on protecting the environment and taking care of the planet, homemade interventions such as AirQo demonstrate their prowess in providing accurate, detailed, and up-to-date information that facilitates informed interventions.
We must eliminate every breath of polluted air on our planet, and technologies like AirQo might hold the key.
Image by Foto-RaBe.