Pollutionwatch: May brought high levels of damaging ozone

Ground-level ozone can damage wheat, mung and soya bean crops, and is harmful to breatheWe often think of ozone as a stratosphere pollutant, where it does a useful job blocking harmful ultraviolet radiation, but it is harmful to breathe and damages our crops, too. In a typical May, UK air pollution can reach between four and six on the government's 10-point scale for a week or so. May 2018 was the hottest since records began in 1919. This brought air pollution problems to the whole of the UK except eastern Scotland. Air pollution reached level 4 or above on 30 days during the month and ozone was one of the main culprits. Continue reading...