Oulu retains Europe’s cleanest air ranking

Oulu has the cleanest air among European cities for the second consecutive year, according to a comparison updated this year by the European Environment Agency, Yle reports.

The comparison included 761 cities. Jyväskylä, Tampere, Kuopio, Espoo and Lahti also placed among the 10 best-performing cities.

Cities were ranked from cleanest to most polluted according to the risk of death associated with pollutants. The comparison covers European cities with more than 50,000 residents where air quality is measured.

Karoliina Niskala, an environmental inspector with the Oulu Region Environmental Office, said Oulu ranked as Europe’s cleanest city for air quality for the first time last year.

According to the City of Oulu, measures to reduce emissions from transport and heating include an extensive district heating network, good public transport connections and investment in cycling infrastructure.

Both private and professional traffic have increasingly switched to lower-emission fuels, the city said in a statement. Oulu’s distance from Europe’s major cities and industrial areas also reduces the amount of air pollution transported there from elsewhere.

Globally, one in eight deaths is caused by air pollution, according to the article. In Finland, however, the risk of death caused by air pollution is described as relatively low. The article states that three out of 100,000 deaths in Finland are caused by air pollution, compared with 12,500 deaths globally.