الموقف المصري

A few days ago, the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Egypt, in partnership with the Ministry of Environment, issued a research paper on pollution in Egypt, the paper was titled Policy Paper: Low Emission Areas.
The paper is very important in shedding light on a policy that is absent in Egypt, which is the policy of low-emission areas, which are areas with lower pollution rates than their surroundings due to a number of economic and environmental policies that the government in Egypt unfortunately does not adopt at the present time.
What are the most important things in this research paper? What can be done to reduce the economic and environmental impact of pollution in Egypt, especially crowded cities like Cairo?
What are the most important things in the paper?
These low-emission areas are geographic areas in which the movement of polluting vehicles (vehicles) is restricted so that carbon emissions and combustion gases for fuel vendors are lower and therefore the temperatures are lower.
Diesel fuel, which is diesel, which is used on a very large scale in mass transportation and freight transport in Egypt, is a major cause of pollution.
The figures issued by a report of the European Commission in 2016 say that cars are the cause of 25% of the greenhouse gas emissions in Egypt, and that cars that work with diesel are a large part of this pollution.
– Diesel in Egypt is besides being a very dangerous pollutant, but even its quality is poor, and that is why the sulfur content is more than 100 times the globally accepted rate of sulfur in diesel.
– Diesel and other pollutants contribute to the presence of highly polluted areas in Egypt due to the movement of vehicles such as Ramses Square, for example, which contains a high percentage of black carbon, one of the most harmful substances and contributes to global warming.
The burning of diesel produces sulfur oxide, which is a very dangerous pollutant for public health in Egypt. Overall, according to the paper, the environmental deterioration contributes to the loss of the Egyptian domestic product to 1.4% annually, which means approximately $5 billion annually.
One of the important needs that the paper also referred to is that these high-emissions areas exist due to urban patterns that do not have enough green spaces, and this is what we have been talking about a lot before.
– Therefore, with the high temperatures in the summer seasons that we are seeing now due to global warming, it is likely that Egypt is experiencing more heat waves and such geographical regions and islands have more heat due to the pollution resulting from chemical residues from burning fuel, especially diesel.
We see this as Egyptians in certain areas such as Ramses and other areas where there are greater traffic densities for diesel-powered vehicles.
The increase in temperature in these areas compared to other areas will be caused by the absorption of heat by roads, buildings and other infrastructure and re-release it back into the air, thus raising the temperature.
– Thus, the idea in designing low-emissions areas is that they work in areas of the city’s atmosphere, so that vehicles are prohibited from entering or confining them to certain vehicles based on many factors, including air quality conditions at this specified time and traffic needs.
Currently, the idea of ​​low-emissions areas exists in more than 260 regions in Europe, and in China, specifically in Beijing, because it is a city with great pollution.
What can be done to reduce diesel pollution in Egypt?
– The paper proposes imposing restrictions, as we said, for the design of low-emissions areas inside Cairo by preventing vehicles such as heavy transport and other vehicles that operate on diesel from crossing them.
Banning cars, except for public transport, and cars of residents of the area at certain times, which will be done by using electronic signals and cameras.
– The paper also suggests something called congestion fees in certain areas, especially those with a high level of pollution in Cairo. These fees are estimated according to the time of entry to the area, the type of vehicle and the distance traveled, and this is something Oslo did in 2017.
– Also in other tools suggested by the paper, such as using a system of parking lots next to metro stations or public transport stations at the beginning of these areas, thus placing parking lots next to stations, usually at the city limits or in the center.
All these needs can contribute to building low-emissions areas, but we also need ambitious projects to change the form of mass transportation in Cairo from relying on diesel to relying on natural gas or electric cars as a non-polluting solution to the environment.
Indeed, the government has begun to work initiatives and plans to reform the transport sector, especially public transport, by relying on converting buses, as they run on gas instead of diesel, and indeed, in steps, they started like the green bus that runs on gas, but its numbers are still very few.
Also, the policy to reduce emissions must be a comprehensive policy that is not limited only to collecting money or preventing diesel cars from entering certain areas, but it must work in parallel with green public spaces that absorb the carbon generated by vehicles, as well as urban designs that build cities that encourage walking and the use of bicycles instead Arabs.
– Therefore, preserving trees and green spaces must be at the heart of the current economic planning policies, because their absence means negative effects on the domestic product in Egypt in the long run.
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Pollution is a real problem facing Egypt, and therefore it must be a top priority for the government in all sectors, starting with the industrial sector, which has many industries that pollute the environment and there is no actual government control over it, and ending with urban planning, which must take into account pollution levels in cities in its design and development plans. .
– We hope the government will take care of the file in the coming period and realize that the urban development that is taking place in the recent period, does not have to include removing a lot of green spaces, because this is bad in the long run for the people and the economy in Egypt.