Are data on air cleanliness in Bulgaria being covered up? According to official statistics, the air quality measuring station in Plovdiv in 2023 recorded 34 days with exceedances of the norms against the permissible 35. These data decreased sharply after 2007, when the station was moved. At that time, a total of 174 violations were reported.
Whether air quality data are being manipulated by moving the stations to cleaner places was opened by the ecological Association “For the Earth”. According to them, some of the stations have been moved and thus the data sent to the European institutions have entered the norm. The Ministry of the Environment and Water countered that, in general, the air in the country is cleaner than before, and the stations are positioned according to the letter of the law.
Lawyer Dimitar Ploshakov shows one of the stations for measuring air purity in Plovdiv. He was the first to file a claim for BGN 10,000 against the Ministry of Environment and Water and won it. “Somebody put her in a park, besides putting her in a park, they also wrapped her in vegetation,”, he points out.
According to him, the station is hidden to measure cleaner air. “The station was moved in 2007, it is the former automatic station “Evmolpia”, which was located in a central location in the city of Plovdiv. But for some reason, there she reported 174 exceedances of the average 24-hour norm of the FPCH. In 2007, due to some reasons related to urban planning changes, approval of the PUP, it was moved to a quieter and calmer place, adds Ploshakov.
From the position of the Ministry of Environment and Water to NOVA, it is clear that at the beginning of the last decade, the relocated station often showed high levels of pollution. Over the years, however, there are fewer and fewer days with fine dust particles. And more - neither they nor the Executive Agency plant vegetation around the stations and claim that the greenery does not affect the samples.
The station on Tsar Boris III Blvd. in Sofia, according to Ivaylo Popov from the Association “For the Earth”, is incorrectly located because it is further from the roadway than the maximum permitted by law. “Both this one and the one in Mladost are transport-oriented stations in Sofia, they do not meet the legal requirements. When I say official information, it is about a report that the Executive Agency for the Environment and the Minister of Environment and Water have been hiding for a long time, he points out.
According to Popov, the station from the Orlov Most area was moved to the Mladost district. “And while we had a station on Orlov Most, Sofia officially had pollution, apart from FPH and nitrogen dioxide,”, he adds.
The Ministry admits that the station “Pavlovo“ is located 400 meters from an intersection and 11 meters from the curb of “Tsar Boris III“ , which exceeds the permitted by a meter. For now, the department's decision is for both stations to remain in the same place.