Cleaning Italy's skies: environmentalists take on deadly urban air pollution

Environmental groups are demanding urgent action to clean up Italy's most polluted cities, which also have the country's highest rate of premature deaths and serious respiratory illnesses.

Italy's farming and industrial heartland, the Po Valley, has some of the worst air quality in Europe and repeatedly fails to meet EU and World Health Organisation targets.

"It is very serious because the Po Valley is one of the five most polluted regional areas in Europe," ‌said Marco Pezzoni, the head of Cremona's Climate, Environment and Health Committee.

‌Figures from the European Environment Agency show that air in Cremona and the Po Valley has four times the World Health Organization's guideline limit for fine particulate matter.‌ It's otherwise known as PM2.5 and has been linked to thousands of premature deaths.

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‌Massimo Esposito has lived in Cremona his whole life and says that the health effects are well documented. He told CGTN: "I know that unfortunately the incidence of deadly diseases is above the norm, and that makes me really scared as a resident."

‌Fellow Cremona resident Silvio Muzi agrees‌. "Unfortunately, in Cremona there are many problems associated with cancer. My partner recently also suffered from this problem," he said.

‌Guido Lanzani from Lombardy's Regional Environmental Protection Agency says the area's geography is partly to blame, explaining: "Po Valley is in a particular situation because there are mountains close Po Valley on three sides, so meteorological conditions are often averse to air dispersion."

‌Pollutants therefore remain in the lowest part of the atmosphere and become more concentrated.‌ Industry and agriculture are other significant factors at play and the area's countless factories clearly demonstrate the environmental cost of economic gains.

‌Italy has repeatedly failed to stay within the EU's air quality limits and new guidelines would reduce pollutants such as fine particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide by up to half by 2030.‌ Authorities claim the situation has improved due to electric vehicles and other initiatives but that EU and WHO targets are still out of reach.

"Our meteorological conditions are so particular that even if our emissions are not worse than other parts of Europe, we need more time," says Lombardy's Lanzani.

‌Environmental groups say it's an excuse that's wearing thin.‌ "There are areas that have a meteorological disadvantage, but it doesn't mean they have less responsibility," asserts Pezzoni.

‌So as the local government fights to extend its deadline, residents continue their battle to save lives.

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