Ambient air quality assessment for three criteria air pollutants (NO2, SO2, and PM10) under various land uses in Gwagwalada, FCT

Abstract

Air pollution and its detrimental health impacts have become a major global environmental and health concern. The aim of this study is to assess air quality under different land uses and determine the variation in air quality between urban and rural areas of Gwagwalada Area Council, Federal Capital Territory (FCT). The concentrations of three criteria pollutants - nitrogen dioxide (NO2), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and particulate matter (PM10) were measured across four identified land uses - market, motor parks, residential and roadside in both urban and rural areas. The average concentration of ambient air pollutants from these different land uses were compared to the standard limits for outdoor concentration established by World Health Organization (WHO), United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) and Federal Ministry of Environment (FMEnv). Among the criteria pollutants, NO2 was not detected across the entire land use types in both urban and rural areas except for urban markets. Average SO2 concentration across the different land uses for urban areas exceeded the limits of WHO and FMEnv. PM10 concentrations varied across land use types but were within the FMEnv and USEPA limits. PM10, and SO2 were the main pollutants in both urban and rural areas. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) result showed that there was no substantial difference in the average concentration of pollutants across urban and rural areas of Gwagwalada Area Council. The study concludes that air quality monitoring should be considered a priority for both urban and rural areas.