STUDY OF AIR POLLUTION

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29273, 3 August 1960, Page 15

STUDY OF AIR POLLUTION

Five-Year- Plan Progress A systematic investigation into air pollution in the siirea of the Christchurch Regional! Planning Authority will be assu red for the next five years wi'hen local authorities confirm an agreement to provide sites, service, and instruments and pay £(i>oo a year, and negotiations are completed with Government departments. The Health Department has agreed to supply all I<the instruments. Eighteen ofi 24 lead peroxide instruments aire already in operation, as are thibee deposit gauges and seven smcike filters. Five more filters Wave been shipped from England, i

In keeping with a •( resolution of the National Air | Pollution Committee, the Regionsill Authority yesterday decided not to investigate specific complaints about the pollution until this present survey was carried out. i

“If Christchurch is td> be built up as an industrial centre, you have to look out for adr pollution,” said Mr E. Somers. He had heard people criticise the fact that the investigation was going to take five yea'rs. The trouble could be stopped by not using coal. Although ithe Los Angeles fog was not as I bad as London’s, its effect on perspns was more severe; but Los Angreles did not use coal. I Air pollution could be I caused not only by smoke but b;|y dust, industrial waste and atmeusphere inversion, said Mr Somers. It was going to take a long while to “get places” with the investigation. ‘ ‘By the end of five ye ars, I think the advisory committe'e will know quite a bit about the causes of air pollution and probably’, give some of the cures,” said! Mr Somers. “You will have answers worthwhile having in five years. If Christchurch grows and . becomes an industrial city, you will have to fight air pollution for a long while, perhaps for ever.’;’ In Los Angeles, bad land drainage was blamed for fog, said Miss M. McLean. Was that correct? Mr Somers: “I would like to know. Whether fog at New Brighton was caused by the Esituary or the Drainage Board's sewage farm or came from the sea was something the committee would like to find out. Some persons without adequate knowledge became hysterical ovelr air pollution, said Mr R. Cl Neville. Investigation of pollution would probably take 30 years. I