Poor air quality in 1 out of 5 Brussels elementary school

It must be no coincidence: just when three French-speaking parties involved in the formation of the Brussels government decided on their own to present a proposal in parliament to postpone the tightening of the emission standard for the low-emission zone (LEZ) in Brussels from the beginning of 2025 to 2027, the non-profit organization Chercheurs d’Air came up with alarming news.

According to the non-profit, air quality in more than 120 elementary schools in Brussels is substandard. More to the point, one in five schools is exposed to concentrations of air pollutants above World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations. The current LEZ schedule in Brussels should, therefore, be maintained, in their view.

Children more vulnerable

According to UC Louvain, which provided software for the study, air pollution is hazardous for children. “Their breathing is not fully mature until they are 12 years old. This makes them more vulnerable than adults,” says Alfred Bernard, a toxicologist at UC Louvain.

According to the study, all Brussels schools are above WHO recommendations for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) emissions. As many as 121 of the 622 preschools and elementary schools surveyed are exposed to NO2 concentrations two to three times higher than WHO recommendations.

Also noteworthy: some communes are harder hit than others. Almost all schools in Saint-Josse and half in Ganshoren and Schaerbeek are exposed to average annual NO2 concentrations between two and three times higher than the WHO recommendation. In all three municipalities, the at-risk-of-poverty rate is over 20%, and in Saint-Josse, it is as high as 34%, the highest in Belgium.

Between 2018 and 2023, thanks in part to the introduction of the LEZ, NO2 concentrations did reduce by 40%, but that remains below international targets. Almost half of NO2 emissions in the capital are caused by road traffic.

The European limit for NO2 is 40 micrograms of NO2 per cubic meter over a year, but Europe wants to tighten the limit to 20 micrograms. The WHO target value is ten micrograms.

More school streets needed

According to the non-profit organization, the current schedule of the LEZ in Brussels must, therefore, be maintained. “It is unacceptable that children in all schools, including kindergartens, damage their health by breathing bad air,” stressed Renaud Leemans of Chercheurs d’Air, freely translated as ‘Air Researchers’. According to the non-profit organization, school streets, temporarily closed to car traffic, are part of the solution to improve air quality near schools.

However, according to the non-profit organization, only 8% of Brussels schools have implemented such a system, while 70% could easily do so. Another path is setting up low-traffic neighborhoods, such as the Good Move networks, whose implementation has seen numerous ups and downs in recent months and which some or all the French-speaking parties involved would also like to eliminate or adjust (all Flemish parties are not in favor either).

A study by the Flemish research institute Vito states that the introduction of a LEZ would result in 100 to 120 fewer premature deaths from air pollution each year by 2030, writes the newspaper De Standaard. The number of NO2-related diseases would also drop by a quarter. All this would save 100 to 135 million euros in health care expenditures.