Air quality in Pachuca

Is Pachuca de Soto a heavily polluted city right now?

Pachuca was formally known as Pachuca de Soto and is the capital and largest city of the Mexican state of Hidalgo. It can be found 90 kilometres from Mexico City. According to a census conducted in 2015 Pachuca had an estimated population of approximately 277,000 people.

Towards the end of 2021, Pachuca was experiencing a period of “Moderate” air quality with a US AQI reading of 59. This United States Air Quality Index number is calculated using the levels of six of the most commonly occurring air pollutants, such as nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, ozone, carbon monoxide and both sizes of particulate matter, which are PM2.5 and PM10. It can then be used as the metric when comparing air quality in other cities around the world. If data is unavailable for all 6 pollutants, a figure can still be calculated by using what figures there are. In the case of Pachuca, only PM2.5 was recorded which was 14.1 µg/m³.

This level of PM2.5 is just below one and a half times above the recommended safe level of 10 µg/m³ as suggested by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as being an acceptable level. Although no amount of air pollution is considered to be safe.

When the level of air pollution is classified as “Moderate”, the given advice would be to remain indoors as much as possible, closing all doors and windows to prevent more polluted air from entering the rooms. Those of a sensitive disposition should limit their time spent outside and should always wear a good quality face mask when doing so. For up-to-date information about air quality, there is an app available from AirVisual which is downloadable for all mobile devices. This will give you the air quality in real-time.

Does the level of air pollution vary much throughout the year in Pachuca?

Air quality is very volatile as it is subject to many external influencing factors such as meteorological and atmospheric changes.

Looking back at the figures for 2020, published by IQAir.com, it can be seen that from August until the end of November, Pachuca achieved the Target figure as recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) of being 10 µg/m³ or less. The month with the lowest reading was September with a 5.9 µg/m³ figure. July returned the next best air quality with a recorded figure of 11.8 µg/m³ which classifies it as being “Good”. The remaining seven months of the year returned figures from the “Moderate” category between 12.1 and 35.4 µg/m³. The worst month of the year was April with a figure of 21.1 µg/m³.

Historically, records regarding air pollution were held in 2017 when a figure of 29.8 µg/m³ was recorded. A vast improvement was noted the following year with a comparatively low figure of 13.3 µg/m³. This rose slightly in 2019 to produce a figure of 15.5 µg/m³. But 2020 returned another low reading of 12.8 µg/m³, however, this reading may have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic as many vehicles were no longer in daily use because the offices were closed, in an attempt to halt the spread of the virus. Many factories and non-essential production units were also required to close which removed their emissions from the atmosphere, albeit it on a temporary basis.

What is the main source of polluted air in Pachuca?

Public transport and the automobile proved to be the means of mobility where the inhabitants of Pachuca, Hidalgo, are exposed to higher concentrations of air pollution, especially in PM2.5 and ozone, pollutants that registered levels above the acceptable limits by national and international standards. Cycle riding proved to be the cleanest.

The increase in the presence of these particles, especially harmful to human health, maybe due to the stops made by public transport, mainly reaching the city centre where the number of cars increases considerably.

In the state of Hidalgo, there are three problematic industries that produce a large number of pollutants into the atmosphere. The refinery generates 269,908 tons of carbon dioxide, the thermoelectric plant 148,792 tons and the cement plants 452,418 tons of carbon dioxide annually.

This most directly affects health, if we breathe a lot of carbon dioxide affects the composition of the blood, if we have a high content of carbon dioxide in the blood it also affects the functions of the whole organism and this is fatal, with that in the long run one dies.

Can anything be done to improve air quality in Pachuca?

Because cycling is the cleanest way of traversing the city it has been suggested that more dedicated cycle tracks are made available instead of the bikes having to use the same polluted roads as the other vehicles.

A large part of the polluting emissions come from transport, which is why vehicle management programs must be updated and measures such as Hoy No Circula should be strengthened.

More investment is needed in sustainable mobility to promote projects in favour of pedestrians and cyclists, as well as zero-emission public transport.

Ongoing prevention and information campaigns so that the population is aware of the quality of the air they breathe in their cities and the impacts this has on their health and what to do to protect themselves.

Control emissions from natural sources, through the prevention and fighting of fires, the recovery of eroded areas and the restoration of areas with environmental benefits, including forest, protected and urban green areas, as well as the management of emissions evaporatives in fuel handling systems in the megalopolis.

What are the health impacts of breathing dirty air in Pachuca?

Contamination does not help in the fight against the coronavirus. The diseases related to pollution are mainly chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma and lung cancer. Patients with these diseases, who also go to the hospital infected with Covid-19, have a higher risk of complications and death.