The Government Council of the Andalusian Regional Government has taken note of the orders from the Ministry of Sustainability, Environment, and Blue Economy regarding the formulation of Air Quality Improvement Plans in five industrial zones of Andalusia: Bay of Algeciras (Cadiz), Bailén (Jaén), Huelva, Carboneras (Almería), and Puente Nuevo (Córdoba).
These plans, which will complement the other seven formulated by the Andalusian government (Granada and its metropolitan area; Bay of Cadiz; areas with populations between 50,000 and 250,000; rural areas; Malaga and the Costa del Sol; Seville and its metropolitan area; and Villanueva del Arzobispo, in Jaén), will be developed because these five areas have exceeded at some point the parameters for particulate matter, ozone, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide recorded at the monitoring stations of the Andalusian Air Quality Surveillance and Control Network and recommended in the Air Quality Strategy approved in 2020.
The future plans will contain, at a minimum, the nature, evaluation, and origin of pollution, quantified objectives for reducing pollution levels to comply with current legislation, and an analysis of the measures to be taken. After the publication in the Official Gazette of Andalusia (BOJA) of the formulation agreement and the elaboration of the received proposals, they will be submitted to Health Impact Assessment by the Ministry of Health and Consumer Affairs.
Territorially, the plan for the industrial zone of the Bay of Algeciras (Cadiz) also affects the towns of La Línea de la Concepción, Los Barrios, and San Roque. In the case of the plan for Bailén, in Jaén, it also includes Villanueva de la Reina, as well as in the case of Carboneras (Almería), which includes Níjar. The plan for the industrial zone of Puente Nuevo includes the Cordovan towns of Espiel, Obejo, and Villaharta, while in the plan for Huelva, in addition to the capital, Aljaraque, Gibraleón, Moguer, Niebla, Palos de la Frontera, Punta Umbría, and San Juan del Puerto are included.
All these municipalities will provide the Ministry of Sustainability, Environment, and Blue Economy with the information requested that is useful for the drafting of the plans, including information regarding urban mobility plans and the planning, development, and execution of sectoral policies, in addition to the proposal of measures within their competencies to be included in the plans, which will be subject to public information for a period of no less than one month and will be offered for public consultation to interested individuals, administrations, and entities for a minimum period of fifteen days.
These plans, which will be approved with the maximum participation, publicity, and transparency, are conceived as a tool aimed at preventing and eliminating air pollution in the area, by adopting the necessary measures to protect the environment against the adverse effects of human activities, as well as maintaining acceptable levels of air quality to safeguard health conditions and, where possible, to restore affected areas.
In this way, their measures, driven by the Andalusian Government in its commitment to combat climate change, will translate into a quantifiable improvement in air quality that will benefit the affected population, with the objective of not exceeding the mandatory limit values, not exceeding the target value for health protection in the case of ozone, and approaching air quality standards to the guideline values established by the World Health Organization.