Air quality in La Trinidad worse than Baguio City

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Air quality in this capital town of Benguet is far worse than Baguio City.

The state-run Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources reported this in its recently conducted quarterly air quality testing.

The provincial capital recorded an estimated 200 total suspended particulates (TSP) in the second quarter of 2013, more than thrice higher than the estimated 70 TSP in the first quarter.

Baguio, once reported as having the worst air quality among five cities in the country by the World Bank, only posted 15 TSP from January to March and 20 TSP from April-June this year.

TSP is used to measure air pollutants.

According to the EMB, people should be alarmed when the TSP level reaches 250.

Officials of the EMB-Cordillera Administrative Region led by Mark Solano told reporters such a high level could have been because of the construction of a building near the testing site.

In 2012, La Trinidad recorded 54 TSP, 2 percent better than in 2011.

Meanwhile, Baguio City in 2012 had 15 TSP, which was a 25-percent improvement from its 2011 rating.

The EMB-Cordillera believed the volume of vehicles prompts the high rating on air pollution, though La Trinidad has been implementing a number-coding scheme as a vehicle reduction mechanism.

The agency is responsible for the Baguio City, La Trinidad, Itogon, Sablan, Tuba and Tublay Air Shed to maintain good air quality including its regular monitoring, tree planting and free emission testing for vehicles.

An additional two Continuous Automatic Ambient Air Quality Monitoring System gadgets will be installed in La Trinidad and Baguio City next year to take a 24-hour air quality monitoring.