They are tiny and very dangerous. We’re talking about ultra-fine dust. A new study is now to determine the contamination of the region with the particles.
Today the time has come: after more than five months of shutdown, the northwest runway at the airport is back in operation because the airport operator Fraport expects more flight movements in the summer. For the residents in the south of Frankfurt, however, the quiet days in their gardens and on their balconies are numbered. Now the jets will again only thunder a few hundred meters over their rooftops.
But it’s not just the increasing aircraft noise that worries the residents, the ultra-fine dust also worries them. These particles are created when fuel is burned in aircraft engines. They are smaller than 100 nanometers. That means: They are so tiny that they reach the blood via the lungs and from there into the whole body. For years, the invisible granules have been suspected of being dangerous and causing diseases such as cardiovascular problems, diabetes and dementia.
There are initial studies on this. However, there is no limit value yet. The research is not there yet. But it is being worked on. This is also shown by a message from the Airport and Region Forum (FFR) yesterday. It says that they want to concentrate more on the topic of ultra-fine dust in the context of air traffic at the airport. The aim is to gain comprehensive knowledge of the various sources of the ultrafine particles, their spread around the airport and the possible health effects. Therefore, by the end of the year, the Environment and Neighborhood House is having a concrete plan drawn up for carrying out a study to determine the pollution of the region with ultra-fine dust.
A consortium consisting of the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research, the Helmholtz Center Geesthacht, the Leibniz Institute for Environmental Medicine Research and the Institute for Atmosphere and Environment at Goethe University Frankfurt has already been commissioned for this purpose.
The study on the effects of ultra-fine dust on human health is only to be prepared and carried out in a second step.
The measurements of the tiny particles in the vicinity of the airport, carried out by the Hessian State Office for Nature Conservation, Environment and Geology (HNLUG), serve as an important basis for the study. These have been taking place since September 2017. There are now nine such measuring stations in the region and on the airport grounds. You can find them at the cemetery in Oberrad, next to the Martin Buber School in Sachsenhausen, in the Niedwald and in Schwanheim. With the help of the devices, it is intended to find out, for example, how the ultrafine dusts are composed, how many particles are in the air and what influence overflights have on the pollution in the environment.
After all, it has already been recognized that the airport is an “important source” of ultra-fine dust. As soon as the wind blows from the direction of the airport, an increased concentration of the particles is measured in Schwanheim, for example. The scientists attribute this to ground traffic on the airport premises. Overflights below an altitude of 400 meters are also said to have a significant influence on the concentration of ultra-fine dust on the ground. To expand the measurements, another measuring device was purchased at the beginning of the year, which does not have a fixed location but can be used at different locations. It should provide further information on the spread of ultrafine dust.
High time for limit values
Frankfurt’s aircraft noise protection officer Ursula Fechter welcomes the announcement of the studies. “Finally you have the ultra-fine dust on the screen. The aviation industry is aware that it has to do something,” she said when asked by this newspaper. “It is high time that limit values were finally set for ultrafine dust. They are dangerous.”
The citizens’ initiatives against the airport expansion have been pointing to studies from abroad for years. Around the airport in Los Angeles, for example, it was confirmed that the ultra-fine dust from airplanes dominates air pollution within a range of up to ten kilometers from an airport.
When examining the apron employees at Copenhagen Airport, however, an increased rate of illness from ultrafine dust was found, and numerous cases of cancer were attributed to the small particles.
The Airport and Region Forum was set up in 2008 as the successor organization to mediation for the expansion of the airport and the regional dialogue forum. The core task is to continue the dialogue and to discuss the effects of air traffic on the region. jlo
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