Belgrade: Where you can literally see the air pollution
Residents of the Serbian capital Belgrade breathe some of the worst air in Europe. The air pollution is so bad that it's visible to the naked eye — especially in winter. Poor air quality has cost thousands of lives in the country already.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 It's early morning in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia.
00:07 The air quality is poor, so much so that the pollution can actually be seen with the naked eye.
00:14 Nothing new, says climate expert Vladimir Djudjevic.
00:22 He has been warning the people of Belgrade about the city's air pollution problem for years.
00:28 What people see in the atmosphere is not fog, he says, but smog.
00:56 From November to March, coal-fired thermal power plants operate at full capacity in Serbia's capital.
01:03 Many people still use fires to heat their homes, which is why air quality in the city deteriorates in winter.
01:10 The situation is made worse by the number of old vehicles on the roads emitting dangerous fumes,
01:16 and the industrial facilities around the city.
01:19 When we look at Europe as a continent, Belgrade is one of the most polluted cities in Europe.
01:27 According to recent research, air pollution caused almost 15,000 premature deaths in Serbia in 2021 alone.
01:36 Physician Tatjana Radovanovic has been studying the consequences of excessive pollution on human health for years.
01:43 She points out that air pollution causes many diseases. Children are particularly at risk.
01:49 Some studies show that in 2050, one in two children could suffer from asthma.
01:57 Air pollution consists of various components.
02:01 It is caused by gases that are respiratory irritants, such as sulfur dioxide and nitric oxide,
02:09 which in the presence of fog or moisture can make strong acids such as sulfur and nitric acid,
02:15 which can also have a negative effect on the health of the lungs.
02:19 But what is even more dangerous are the so-called PM2.5 and PM10 particles.
02:25 Why are they dangerous?
02:27 Because they are very small and when we inhale them, they pass through the lungs,
02:32 enter the smallest parts of the lungs, pass into the blood and practically spread throughout the entire body.
02:39 Dejan Lekic from the Serbian Environmental Protection Agency created an app that provides real-time information on air quality.
02:54 The colors on the screen that are dominant show that the air in Belgrade at this moment is bad,
03:01 extremely bad or very bad in most cases.
03:05 Serbia's government has responded to the situation by adopting its Air Protection Programme 2030.
03:12 This includes a series of measures such as making factories greener and gradually taking older vehicles off the road.
03:20 Air pollution, officials say, should be halved by 2030. But is this realistic?
03:45 While Belgrade's efforts to become a greener city all sound good on paper,
03:50 many locals doubt that a stroll in the park will mean breathing cleaner air any time soon.
03:57 For more information, visit www.srb.org
04:02 Thank you for watching!
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