This publication summarises the concentrations of major air pollutants as measured by the Automatic Urban and Rural Network (AURN). This release covers annual average concentrations in the UK of:
The release also covers the number of days when air pollution was ‘Moderate’ or higher for any one of five pollutants listed below:
These statistics are used to monitor progress against the UK’s reduction targets for concentrations of air pollutants. Improvements in air quality help reduce harm to human health and the environment.
Air quality in the UK is strongly linked to anthropogenic emissions of pollutants. For more information on UK emissions data and other information please refer to the air quality and emissions statistics GOV.UK page.
The statistics in this publication are based on data from the Automatic Urban and Rural Network (AURN) of air quality monitors. The https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">UK-AIR website contains the latest air quality monitoring data for the UK and detailed information about the different monintoring networks that measure air quality. The website also hosts the latest data produced using Pollution Climate Mapping (PCM) which is a suite of models that uses both monitoring and emissions data to model concentrations of air pollutants across the whole of the UK. The UK-AIR website also provides air pollution episode updates and information on Local Authority Air Quality Management Areas as well as a number of useful reports.
The monitoring data is continuously reviewed and subject to change when issues are highlighted. This means that the time series for certain statistics may vary slightly from year to year. You can access editions of this publication via The National Archives or the links below.
The datasets associated with this publication can be found here ENV02 - Air quality statistics.
As part of our ongoing commitment to compliance with the https://code.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">Code of Practice for Official Statistics we wish to strengthen our engagement with users of air quality data and better understand how the data is used and the types of decisions that they inform. We invite users to https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=UCQKdycCYkyQx044U38RAvtqaLEKUSxHhjbo5C6dq4lUMFBZMUJMNDNCS0xOOExBSDdESVlHSEdHUi4u&route=shorturl" class="govuk-link">register as a “user of Air Quality data”, so that we can retain your details, inform you of any new releases of Air Quality statistics and provide you with the opportunity to take part in user engagement activities that we may run. If you would like to register as a user of Air Quality data, please provide your details in the attached https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=UCQKdycCYkyQx044U38RAvtqaLEKUSxHhjbo5C6dq4lUMFBZMUJMNDNCS0xOOExBSDdESVlHSEdHUi4u&route=shorturl" class="govuk-link">form.
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20250609165125/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2023
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20230802031254/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2022
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20230301015627/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2021
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20211111164715/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2020
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20201225100256/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2019
<a rel="external" href="https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20200303
This data was revised on March 13th 2025 to apply the latest, improved domestic combustion methodology across all sources. This correction has impacted domestic combustion emissions across the time series causing a substantial reduction to sulphur dioxide emissions and a minor increase to NMVOC emissions.
This publication provides estimates of UK emissions of particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5), nitrogen oxides, ammonia, non-methane volatile organic compounds and sulphur dioxide.
These estimates are used to monitor progress against the UK’s emission reduction targets for air pollutants. Emission reductions in the UK, alongside a number of other factors such as the weather, contribute to improvements in air quality in the UK and other countries. For more information on air quality data and information please refer to the "https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/air-quality-and-emissions-statistics" class="govuk-link">air quality and emissions statistics GOV.UK page.
The https://naei.beis.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory website contains information on anthropogenic UK emissions and compilation methods for a wide range of air pollutants; as well as hosting a number of reports including the Devolved Administrations’ Air Quality Pollutant Inventories.
The methodology to estimate emissions is continuously reviewed and developed to take account of new data sources, emission factors and modelling methods. This means the whole emissions time series from 1990 to the reporting year is revised annually.
Please note: Due to methodological updates and improvements which are routinely carried out each year, the data and trends discussed here are not directly comparable to those published in previous iterations of this Accredited Official Statistics release. More information can be found in the accompanying Methods Document. For year-on-year changes in emissions, the trends presented within this document and the accompanying statistical tables should be used.
If you do wish to see the impact of these methodological changes, you can access previous editions of this publication via https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/*/https:/www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">The National Archives or the links below. As it takes time to compile and analyse the data from many different sources, this statistic publication is produced with a 2-year delay from the reporting year, meaning that this year’s inventory represents the reporting year 2023.
Please email us with your feedback to help us make the publication more valuable to you.
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20240315195515/https:/www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2022
Published: 14 February 2024
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20221124144722/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2021
Published: 18 February 2023
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20221225221936/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2020
Published: 14 February 2022
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20210215184515/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2019
Published: 12 February 2021
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20201014182239/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2018
Published: 14 February 2020
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20200103213653/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants" class="govuk-link">Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2017
Published: 15 February 2019
<a rel="external" href="https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/
This data set contains data on the concentrations of major air pollutants as measured by the Automatic Urban and Rural Network (AURN).
If you require the data in another format please contact: AQIE.Correspondence@defra.gov.uk
<p class="gem-c-attachment_metadata"><span class="gem-c-attachment_attribute"><abbr title="OpenDocument Spreadsheet" class="gem-c-attachment_abbr">ODS</abbr></span>, <span class="gem-c-attachment_attribute">247 KB</span></p>
<p class="gem-c-attachment_metadata">
This file is in an <a href="https://www.gov.uk/guidance/using-open-document-formats-odf-in-your-organisation" target="_self" class="govuk-link">OpenDocument</a> format
<p class="gem-c-attachment_metadata"><span class="gem-c-attachment_attribute"><abbr title="OpenDocument Spreadsheet" class="gem-c-attachment_abbr">ODS</abbr></span>, <span class="gem-c-attachment_attribute">211 KB</span></p>
<p class="gem-c-attachment_metadata">
This file is in an <a href="https://www.gov.uk/guidance/using-open-document-formats-odf-in-your-organisation" target="_self" class="govuk-link">OpenDocument</a> format
Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 (CC BY-NC 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
This resource contains national-scale outdoor nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and ozone (O3) exposure surfaces for England and Wales in 2018, 2019, and 2020 at very high spatial resolutions (10m and 100m). These exposures are also summarised for the 2021 UK Census Output Area (COA) communities, using population-weighted (residential) and area-weighted (community background) sampling techniques.The exposure surfaces were created using the HADES: Hybrid Air Dispersion Exposure System modelling framework, which combines dispersion modelling with satellite-derived estimates of background concentrations, land cover, and a 3-D representation of buildings, in a statistical calibration framework.The 10m annual-average concentration surfaces reported r-squared (goodness-of fit) values of 0.80 for NO2 and 0.86 for O3, with respect to measurement data at 136 locations in the UK governments automatic monitoring network. The same annual-average NO2 and O3 surfaces are associated with root mean squared error (RMSE) values of 4.90 µg/m3 and 3.17 µg/m3, respectively.The air pollution surfaces and their associated data are freely available for non-commercial use (CC BY-NC 4.0) under the condition that the following source is cited:Jephcote, C., and Gulliver, J. (2025). Development and evaluation of rapid, national-scale outdoor air pollution modelling and exposure assessment: Hybrid Air Dispersion Exposure System (HADES). Environment International, Vol 197. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2025.109304Version 1.3 of the surfaces uploaded on 17.03.2025
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
This data set is a collection of estimated daily mean and maximum values for a range of air quality and meterological measurements and model forecasts for the UK and crown dependencies postcode districts (e.g. 'AB') for the years 2016-2019, inclusive.
The paper describing this dataset is available here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-022-01135-6
The data uses a 'concentric regions' method to estimate the measurement for all regions, as follows. If measurements exist within the region, the mean of those measurements is used, if not, then a ring of neighbouring postcode regions are selected, and the mean of their measurement values used. If no measurement sites/data are found in the first ring, the process continues, taking the next ring of postcode district regions, working outwards until one or more sensors are found in a ring. As well as the measurement estimations, the number of rings required to find site data and make the estimations is also published. As a result, please note that estimations with higher ring counts ('rings') are likely to be calculated from more distant sensors. This distance depends upon the size of the postcode regions surrounding the location being estimated. Please use the ring count ('rings') to limit/filter estimations based on your required level of confidence.
The meteorological, pollen and air quality measurement data used to make the regional estimations can be found at this Zenodo archive. The data there contains Temperature, Relative Humidity, and Pressure data, downloaded from the Met Office MIDAS archives via the MEDMI server (https://www.data-mashup.org.uk/). Also downloaded from the MEDMI server are daily pollen measurements for the UK. PM10, PM2.5, NO2, NOx (as NO2), O3, and SO2 measurements from the DEFRA AURN network, and also model forecasts of the same made using the EMEP model.
The code used to make the estimations is available at this Zenodo archive.
The postcode data in postcode_district_data.csv are collated from several sources:
https://www.doogal.co.uk/UKPostcodes.php (population figures for the UK (UK Census 2011))
https://www.freemaptools.com/download-uk-postcode-outcode-boundaries.htm (postcode boundary polygons for UK and crown dependancies)
https://www.gov.gg/population (Guernsey (GY) population data for end June 2020)
https://www.gov.je/Government/JerseyInFigures/Population/Pages/Population.aspx (Jersey (JE) population data for end 2019)
https://www.gov.im/media/1369690/isle-of-man-in-numbers-july-2020.pdf (Isle of Man (IM) population data for April 2016)
The data-set is presented in CSV format, as six files:
postcode_district_data.csv: location metadata (region_id, geometry, description, population, country)
regional_site_counts.csv: a table showing the number of sites for each measurement (columns), for each region_id (rows). region_id's match those in the postcode_district_data.csv file.
turing_regional_estimates_aq_daily_met_pollen_pollution_imputed_data.csv: uses imputed site data (timestamp, region_id, ...[measurement name, rings]) ('rings' is the number of rings required to make the estimation)
turing_regional_estimates_aq_daily_met_pollen_pollution_original_data.csv: uses original site data (timestamp, region_id, ...[measurement name, rings]) ('rings' is the number of rings required to make the estimation)
turing_regional_estimates_aq_loc_type_daily_imputed_data.csv: uses imputed site data. Air quality regional estimates are calculated using specific AQ site location types* separately. (To prevent, for example, 'Traffic Urban' type sites being used to estimate 'non-traffic' or rural regions.)
turing_regional_estimates_aq_loc_type_daily_original_data.csv: uses original data. Air quality regional estimates are calculated using specific AQ site location types* separately. (To prevent, for example, 'Traffic Urban' type sites being used to estimate 'non-traffic' or rural regions.)
Industrial: comprises 'urban industrial' (9 sites) and suburban industrial (2 sites)
'Rural background' (14 sites)
'Urban background' (48 sites)
'Urban traffic' (47 sites)
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
UK: CO2 Emissions: Kg per PPP of GDP 2017 Price data was reported at 0.110 kg in 2020. This records a decrease from the previous number of 0.110 kg for 2019. UK: CO2 Emissions: Kg per PPP of GDP 2017 Price data is updated yearly, averaging 0.210 kg from Dec 1990 (Median) to 2020, with 31 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 0.329 kg in 1991 and a record low of 0.110 kg in 2020. UK: CO2 Emissions: Kg per PPP of GDP 2017 Price data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United Kingdom – Table UK.World Bank.WDI: Environmental: Gas Emissions and Air Pollution. Carbon dioxide emissions are those stemming from the burning of fossil fuels and the manufacture of cement. They include carbon dioxide produced during consumption of solid, liquid, and gas fuels and gas flaring.;Climate Watch. 2020. GHG Emissions. Washington, DC: World Resources Institute. Available at: https://www.climatewatchdata.org/ghg-emissions. See NY.GDP.MKTP.PP.KD for the denominator's source.;Weighted average;
These statistics provide the most reliable and consistent breakdown of CO2 emissions across the country, using nationally available data sets going back to 2005.
The main data sources are the UK National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory and the BEIS National Statistics of energy consumption for local authority areas. All emissions included in the national inventory are covered, except aviation, shipping and military transport, for which there is no obvious basis for allocation to local areas.
Publications:
In addition, http://naei.defra.gov.uk/data/local-authority-co2-map" class="govuk-link">interactive local authority level emissions maps are published on the National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory (NAEI) website on behalf of BEIS. Users can zoom in to any UK local authority, see the emissions for the area and identify the significant point sources, such as iron and steel plants. The data can be filtered by sector, and to see how emissions have changed across the time series.
https://naei.beis.gov.uk/reports/reports?report_id=999" class="govuk-link">Air pollution data are also available on a local authority basis which looks at a number of gases that cause air pollution. Carbon dioxide which is presented in the emissions reports above is also considered an air pollutant. A number of activities contribute to both air pollutant and carbon dioxide emissions. Other activities that contribute to carbon dioxide emissions do not contribute to air pollutant emissions and vice versa.
This is a National Statistics publication and complies with the code of practice for statistics. Please check our frequently asked questions or email Climatechange.Statistics@beis.gov.uk if you have any questions or comments about the information on this page.
Transportation sector carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions in the United Kingdom are projected to decrease by roughly 52 percent between 2023 and 2050 under the reference scenario. Under a scenario with similar assumptions to the reference scenario but with higher fossil fuel prices (FFP - high), transportation sector CO₂ emissions would fall by the exact same amount, over the same time frame, to 52 million metric tons (MtCO₂).
SUMMARYMortality burden associated with long-term exposure to anthropogenic (human-made) particulate air pollution (measured as fine particulate matter, PM2.5*) at current levels, expressed as the percentage of annual deaths from all causes in those aged 30+.* PM2.5 means the mass (in micrograms) per cubic metre of air of individual particles with an aerodynamic diameter generally less than 2.5 micrometers. PM2.5 is also known as fine particulate matter.The raw data, plus a full description of the dataset and information that may aid interpretation of the data, are available here.DATA SOURCESFraction of mortality attributable to particulate air pollution: © Public Health England 2021.Administrative boundaries: Boundary-LineTM: Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2020. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.COPYRIGHT NOTICE© Public Health England 2021; Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2020. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.CaBA HEALTH & WELLBEING EVIDENCE BASEThis dataset forms part of the wider CaBA Health and Wellbeing Evidence Base.
This file describes the dataset used in Ou et al., "Air pollution control strategies directly limiting national health damages in the US." This work used the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM) with state-level representation of the U.S. energy system (GCAM-USA). GCAM and GCAM-USA are developed and released by the University of Maryland/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Joint Global Change Research Center (JGCRI). For further details, see the GCAM documentation: jgcri.github.io/gcam-doc. The model source code is available at github.com/JGCRI/gcam-core. A modified version of GCAMv4.3 was used for this analysis. Source code and input data specific for this paper are available upon request. This dataset contains Excel spreadsheets and an R script that link to comma-separated values (CSV) files that were extracted from the model output. The spreadsheets and scripts show the data and reproduce each of the figures in the paper. This dataset is associated with the following publication: Ou, Y., J. West, S. Smith, C. Nolte, and D. Loughlin. Air pollution control strategies directly limiting national health damages in the US.. Nature Communications. Nature Publishing Group, London, UK, 11: 957, (2020).
The OECD Environmental Statistics database provide a unique collection of policy-relevant environmental statistics.
According to a survey of 2,000 adults within the United Kingdom, ** percent said they were concerned about plastic pollution. In a bid to reduce plastic pollution, ** percent said they have taken steps to reduce their use of single-use plastics, while ** percent want the UK government to make refillable products easier to buy and more widely available. It is estimated that almost ************ metric tons of plastics placed on the UK market become waste.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
License information was derived automatically
The UK government's revenue from environmental taxes (including energy, transport and pollution or resource taxes), 1997 to 2024 (where available).
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/metadata-codelist/LimitationsOnPublicAccess/noLimitationshttp://inspire.ec.europa.eu/metadata-codelist/LimitationsOnPublicAccess/noLimitations
https://eidc.ceh.ac.uk/licences/OGL/plainhttps://eidc.ceh.ac.uk/licences/OGL/plain
Data comprise monthly ammonia air concentrations from UK CEH ALPHA® (Adapted Low-cost Passive High Absorption) samplers co-located with UKEAP DELTA sites. The UK Eutrophying and Acidifying atmospheric Pollutants (UKEAP) network measures air pollutants at rural sites across the UK. The UK CEH ALPHA® sampler is a passive sampler for measuring NH3 in air. Originally the purpose of these measurements was for a calibrated ALPHA® uptake rate for the UK CEH Edinburgh research laboratory. Local site operator duties are completed by UK CEH staff and AFBI staff (at Hillsborough) and analysis is completed by UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology Edinburgh. The sites were set up on 1st March 2020 and measurements are ongoing. Full details about this dataset can be found at https://doi.org/10.5285/1766eb32-1878-47e6-8dc8-d434957d1e32
The map shows annual mean concentrations of Particulate Matter (PM2.5) in Europe based on daily averages with at least 75% of valid measurements, in µg/m3 (source: EEA, AirBase v.8 & AQ e-Reporting)Thresholds used in the maps for annual values [µg/m3]:≤ 10: (10 μg/m3, as set out in the WHO air quality guideline for PM2.5)> 10 ≤ 20: (20 μg/m3, limit value as set out in the Air Quality Directive, 2008/50/EC)> 20 ≤ 25: (25 μg/m3, target value as set out in the Air Quality Directive, 2008/50/EC)> 25 ≤ 30> 30Source: AirBase v.8 & AQ e-ReportingAirBase is the European air quality database maintained by the EEA through its European topic centre on Air pollution and Climate Change mitigation. It contains air quality monitoring data and information submitted by participating countries throughout Europe.The air quality database consists of a multi-annual time series of air quality measurement data and statistics for a number of air pollutants. It also contains meta-information on those monitoring networks involved, their stations and their measurements.The database covers geographically all EU Member States, the EEA member countries and some EEA collaborating countries. The EU Member States are bound under Decision 97/101/EC to engage in a reciprocal exchange of information (EoI) on ambient air quality. The EEA engages with its member and collaborating countries to collect the information foreseen by the EoI Decision because air pollution is a pan European issue and the EEA is the European body which produces assessments of air quality, covering the whole geographical area of Europe.
https://artefacts.ceda.ac.uk/licences/missing_licence.pdfhttps://artefacts.ceda.ac.uk/licences/missing_licence.pdf
This dataset contains raw and processed levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), particles (PM10 & PM2.5) in ambient air in Oxford, UK. These are derived from low cost sensor units located ...... The raw data is at 10-second intervals and the processed data is at 15-minute and 1-hour resolutions. The raw data is available in JSON format 2020 to 2022 and the processed data is available in CSV format Oct 2020 to Oct 2021. These data were collected for the OxAria project.
The Oxaria project is a Natural Environmental Research Council funded collaboration between the University of Birmingham and University of Oxford, supported by public and commercial partners. The project has applied advanced technological and environmental health expertise to understand the air and noise impacts of COVID-19 across Oxford City. See also https://oxaria.org.uk/
For Project record: - The application of high-resolution sensing technology in this context offers potential to measure air pollution at an unprecedented scale and scope, providing a more comprehensive picture of air pollution across Oxford than has previously been possible. Data obtained before, during and after relevant COVID-19 restrictions have been used to understand impacts upon road traffic, air and noise pollution levels and to assess implications for healthy life expectancy and therefore human health. This information will be used to provide an evidence-base for air quality policy within local authorities, public agencies and national Government.
https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/data/gis-licenceshttps://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/data/gis-licences
1x1km background of Nitrogen Dioxide annual mean Limit Value concentrations modelled by Defra’s Pollution Climate Mapping Model.
Building on the achievements of the ESRC-DFID funded project Blood Bricks, in Cambodia and Safe and Sustainable Cities, in Bangladesh, this program aimed to extend the in-country benefit of those projects upwards and outwards in order to examine the intersections between poverty, environmental sustainability and fragility of livelihoods. Bringing together experts in supply chain analysis, embodied emissions, and construction to work with government and industry on the environmental and human impacts of international trade, the impact activities frame the issue of embodied emissions not only in terms of carbon emissions, but also poverty and inequality, highlighting how international trade and investment serve, as shown in our prior grants, to exacerbate poverty in the global South due to the 'close links between climate change and social inequality'.
he project undertook an expanded supply chain analysis to highlight the social and environmental footprint of the UK's £1.4 billion of trade with Cambodia. It calculated the emissions embodied in bricks imported from Bangladesh, where brick production is associated with 'toxic fumes and atrocious working conditions'. The project also addressed growing concerns over the impact of air pollution and massive topsoil harvesting for the brick industry on local people's ability to sustain traditional livelihoods. Additionally, it conducted independent fieldwork in study sites in Cambodia, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka to explore environmental impacts and livelihoods associated with UK supply chains. Original photography was undertaken in Bangladesh, Cambodia, and Sri Lanka to document these findings visually.
The archived collection contains only the secondary data from open sources, reports, and selected photographs due to the need to protect the identities of participants and respect their privacy wishes. This selective approach ensures compliance with ethical standards while allowing for a broad dissemination of the findings.
Dataset Name: Air Pollution - Particulate Matter 2.5Data Owner: DEFRAContact: opendatani@nidirect.gov.ukSource: Data.gov.ukSource URL: https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/data/laqm-background-mapsUploaded to SPACE Geoportal: 01/06/2023Update Frequency: when available via DEFRAScale Threshold: N/AProjection : Irish GridFormat: Esri Feature Layer (hosted) Point dataNotes:Point data covering NI from the DEFRA website. Please take time to read the guidance linked below.Please note: These background mapped data are specifically for LAQM purposes only. Please use them in conjunction with reading the Background Maps User Guide. The projections in the 2018 LAQM background maps are based on assumptions which were current before the Covid-19 outbreak in the UK. In consequence these maps do not reflect short or longer term impacts on emissions in 2020 and beyond resulting from behavioural change during the national or local lockdowns.Only the most recent mapped data should be used for new air quality assessments. Older data can continue to be used for research or on-going assessments.For more general interest in UK air quality mapping please visit the UK Ambient Air Quality Interactive Map
Transportation carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions in the United Kingdom decreased by *** percent in 2024 to *** million metric tons (MtCO₂). The outbreak of COVID-19 caused UK transportation emissions to plummet almost ** percent in 2020, which greatly contributed to overall UK CO₂ emissions reductions that year. Although emissions from this sector have rebounded since then, they remained below pre-pandemic levels. Transportation is the largest source of UK emissions The energy supply sector was once the largest source of emissions in the UK, but a shift away from coal use and a transition to cleaner energy sources has significantly cut emissions from this sector. As a result, energy supply emissions have fallen below those emitted by transportation, which is now the largest source of UK emissions. UK road transportation emissions Road vehicles are a major source of carbon pollution in the UK, with passenger cars the largest source of transportation emissions. Passenger cars are followed by heavy goods vehicles and light duty vehicles.
This publication summarises the concentrations of major air pollutants as measured by the Automatic Urban and Rural Network (AURN). This release covers annual average concentrations in the UK of:
The release also covers the number of days when air pollution was ‘Moderate’ or higher for any one of five pollutants listed below:
These statistics are used to monitor progress against the UK’s reduction targets for concentrations of air pollutants. Improvements in air quality help reduce harm to human health and the environment.
Air quality in the UK is strongly linked to anthropogenic emissions of pollutants. For more information on UK emissions data and other information please refer to the air quality and emissions statistics GOV.UK page.
The statistics in this publication are based on data from the Automatic Urban and Rural Network (AURN) of air quality monitors. The https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">UK-AIR website contains the latest air quality monitoring data for the UK and detailed information about the different monintoring networks that measure air quality. The website also hosts the latest data produced using Pollution Climate Mapping (PCM) which is a suite of models that uses both monitoring and emissions data to model concentrations of air pollutants across the whole of the UK. The UK-AIR website also provides air pollution episode updates and information on Local Authority Air Quality Management Areas as well as a number of useful reports.
The monitoring data is continuously reviewed and subject to change when issues are highlighted. This means that the time series for certain statistics may vary slightly from year to year. You can access editions of this publication via The National Archives or the links below.
The datasets associated with this publication can be found here ENV02 - Air quality statistics.
As part of our ongoing commitment to compliance with the https://code.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">Code of Practice for Official Statistics we wish to strengthen our engagement with users of air quality data and better understand how the data is used and the types of decisions that they inform. We invite users to https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=UCQKdycCYkyQx044U38RAvtqaLEKUSxHhjbo5C6dq4lUMFBZMUJMNDNCS0xOOExBSDdESVlHSEdHUi4u&route=shorturl" class="govuk-link">register as a “user of Air Quality data”, so that we can retain your details, inform you of any new releases of Air Quality statistics and provide you with the opportunity to take part in user engagement activities that we may run. If you would like to register as a user of Air Quality data, please provide your details in the attached https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=UCQKdycCYkyQx044U38RAvtqaLEKUSxHhjbo5C6dq4lUMFBZMUJMNDNCS0xOOExBSDdESVlHSEdHUi4u&route=shorturl" class="govuk-link">form.
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20250609165125/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2023
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20230802031254/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2022
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20230301015627/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2021
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20211111164715/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2020
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20201225100256/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/air-quality-statistics" class="govuk-link">Air Quality Statistics in the UK, 1987 to 2019
<a rel="external" href="https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20200303