Holidaymakers Urged to Maintain Eco-Friendly Focus

Holidaymakers are being urged to maintain their eco-friendly focus when travel access improves

dealchecker.co.uk have urged holidaymakers to maintain their eco-friendly focus when travel access improves, through a worldwide study analysing pollution levels during lockdown.

The study confirms countries around the world have seen pollution rates dropped as governments altered lifestyle and travel patterns amid coronavirus.

However, as some countries around the world are reopening and travelling restrictions are being lifted some places are starting to register a decrease in their air quality.

dealchecker aims to raise awareness among travellers to help keep air pollution levels low by following simple tips such as paying to offset the CO2 emissions caused by your journey, considering train travel (it only produces around 50% of the emissions of a plane journey to the same place) or avoiding taxis and buses where possible and instead using your feet to explore your holiday destination.

Stephen Molloy, dealchecker MD said: “As humans, we will always want to travel to see places and experience cultures different to our own in order to expand our lives, and make them richer. dealchecker still wants you to be able to experience new and exciting places but we’re asking our users to stop and think about the little things that each of us can do to make a difference and protect our home.”

The study measures the amount of particles in the atmosphere with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or less (PM2.5).

From the cities in the study, average PM2.5 readings in April 2019 sat at 72.8 compared to 57.2 in April 2020. In fact, 83% of the cities analysed have actually shown an improvement in air quality since governments introduced lockdowns.

Top five cities with biggest change:

  1. Canberra, Australia: -83.1%
  2. Kabul, Afghanistan: -68.9%
  3. Stockholm, Sweden: -62.7%
  4. Tbilisi, Georgia: -48.1%
  5. Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan: -46.7%

However, at the other end of the scale Serbia actually has had one of the shortest lockdown periods of lockdown and has one of the largest air pollution growth in the study – a 27.8% rise. Serbia isn’t the only country to see increases with other countries seeing rises.

Top five cities with increased pollution rates:

  1. Ankara, Turkey: +58.0%
  2. Madrid, Spain: +45.4%
  3. Hanoi, Vietnam: +36.9%
  4. Belgrade, Serbia: +27.8%
  5. Manama, Bahrain: +9.2%

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