European Air Pollution Is Behind an Environmental Prejudice Worth €169 Billion ($223Billion)

The European Environment Agency says that major European facilities have to take €169 Billion ($223 billion) our of their pockets to minimize the impact of industrial pollution upon public health and the wellbeing of the environment.

In order to reach a pertinent conclusion EEA analyzed the level of pollution boosted by 10,000 important companies all across Europe.

Moreover, it seems that 191 facilities managed to produce almost half of the entire damage revealed by the organization, apparently worth up to €85 billion ($112 billion).

Even though it is hard to imagine that experts can correlate environmental degradation with an exact amount of money, unless we are talking about major clean-up operations, EPA officials say they used the data provided by those enterprises and managed to link the amount of harmful emissions with the costs they imply.

Surprisingly, they found out that air pollution triggered by 10,000 players covered by EEA’s report cost every European citizen up to €330 ($436) for 2009 only. Experts took every polluting facility into consideration, from common power stations and to giant industrial power plants.

“The estimated costs are calculated using the emissions reported by the facilities themselves. By using existing tools employed by policy-makers to estimate harm to health and the environment, we revealed some of the hidden costs of pollution. We cannot afford to ignore these issues,” states Professor McGlade.

The report, ‘Revealing the costs of air pollution from industrial facilities in Europe,’ highlights the impact power plants, refineries, fuel and waste generating operations have upon the environment. The most severe harmful effect was recorded by power plants. Their damages are apparently worth up to €112 billion ($148 billion).

At the same time, production processes are responsible for harmful factors worth €28 billion ($37 billion), while companies manufacturing combustion have to give up to €21 billion ($27 billion) back to the European inhabitants, according to the report.

Unfortunately, the report does not estimate the contribution of households, agricultural sectors and transportation in decreasing the air quality, perhaps because the number provided is already alarming enough.

Of course, it appears easier to blame the giant power plants than to take a look at what's really going on in our own households.