A Two City study of Air Quality in Vietnam

The World Health Organisation (WHO) describes poor air quality as the largest single environmental health risk and attributes 8 million deaths annually to the consequences of exposure to air pollution. Vietnam is one of the fastest growing economies in SE Asia and, as a result, has undergone rapid urbanisation, industrialisation and population growth. This has led to the deterioration of, amongst other factors, air quality, with Vietnam being one of the most polluted countries in the world, ranked 170th out of 180 countries for air quality in a recent survey (Environmental Performance Index, Yale University, 2016).

Air quality monitoring in Vietnam is patchy and many of the previously-reported studies are now quite dated. Given the rapid economic development and the growth of cities such as Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, there is a pressing need for new, up-to-date air quality measurements and a reassessment of the major sources of the observed pollution.

For this study we propose to make measurements of a range of air quality indicators in the 2 largest cities in Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City in the south and Hanoi in the north in order to improve our understanding of the concentrations and sources of air pollution in these contrasting environments. Measurements will be made during both the dry and wet seasons when the prevailing winds and likely sources of pollution could be quite different. The UK groups will take a range of analytical equipment to Vietnam which will complement the existing measurements made by the Vietnam partners. These instruments will vastly improve the speciation of measurements currently available, including detailed information on the organic compounds found in both the gas and particulate phase, the latter using novel mass spectrometric detection techniques. This will provide us with significantly enhanced datasets of both gas phase and particulate species which will allow us to better identify the key pollutants for human health and the relative importance of different emissions sources in the 2 cities using various data analysis tools including positive matrix factorisation (PMF).

An important component of the project will be knowledge exchange and capacity building with the Vietnamese partners. This will include the hosting of Vietnamese staff in the UK for several months to learn techniques including particle filter analysis, air sensor technology and the use of source apportionment software such as PMF.

The resultant air pollution database will be the largest and most comprehensive in Vietnam to date and will serve as a valuable resource for future air quality modelling studies, the verification of emission inventories and for the design of effective abatement strategies. To disseminate our findings we will organise a workshop in Vietnam towards the end of the project to which we will invite representatives from various academic, governmental and non-governmental organisations.

In the longer term the main beneficiaries of our research will be the current and future residents of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. These population centres in Vietnam are regularly exposed to poor air quality from a range of sources leading to poor health outcomes. A better understanding of the magnitude and sources of this pollution, which will be key outcomes of the proposed work, will allow better-informed choices to be made about future monitoring activity and potential abatement strategies. The sensor technology in particular represents a potential low cost solution to establishing a more reliable longer-term observational capability which would be attractive to organisations responsible for air quality monitoring, both in Vietnam and in the wider region in general. Sensors are cheaper, smaller, use less power and are simpler to operate than the standard air quality monitoring equipment so will be attractive to countries with less resource.

The results of our work will therefore be of considerable interest to policy makers and other stakeholders in Vietnam. We have identified a number of key governmental and non-governmental organisations in Vietnam with a strong interest in air quality issues. These include the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MONRE), the Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Development (MARD), the Vietnam Environmental Administration (VEA), the Pollution Control Department (PCD-VEA), the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) of Hanoi City and Ho Chi Minh City, the Department of Natural Resources and Environment (DONRE) of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, the Centre for Environmental Monitoring and Analysis - HCMC Environmental Protection Agency (HEPA) and the Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities (CAI-Asia) in Hanoi.

To maximise the potential impact of our work these stakeholders will be invited to a workshop to be hosted in Ho Chi Minh City in 2019 where we will present our results. In addition we will advertise our work through press releases and public engagement events in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

Finally, the sensor technology providers will benefit from the additional in-field data produced by this study in terms of sensor and instrument performance in a sub-tropical environment.

We have an agreement in place with the Southern Environment Agency in HCMC with whom we will discuss the outcomes of our research (see letter of support).