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Recommendation 6, para. 122
It is recommended that the most practicable efficient methods of removing sulphur from flue gases
should be adopted at all power stations in or near polluted areas. The only remedy suggested for sulphur
is very intensive research. We are of the opinion that the Government should make it obligatory on every
installation burning over 50,000 tons of fuel per annum to install gas-washing plant or other approved
appliances, so as to remove not less than 90% sulphur from the gases, and further that this should be
applied to existing as well as new installations. We recommend that, in addition, action should be taken to
prevent the remainder of sulphur from the gases being deposited in the neighbourhood."
Whether the recommendations of the Beaver Committee or amendments to them are incorporated
in the new Act, one thing is abundantly clear—a new Act is urgently needed. Unless the Council is given
greater powers to deal with atmospheric pollution it may have to face a situation similar to that in 1952, when
there was a severe fog and the total deaths in Willesden during the nine week period were almost 50%
more and deaths from bronchitis five times greater than in Dorset (Tables 3 and 4), Even in a year without
a severe fog, total deaths in Willesden are 20% more, deaths from pneumonia 50% more, and from
bronchitis two and a half times greater than in Dorset (Tables 3 and 5). Although, of course, overcrowding
and poor housing conditions have a profound influence in producing these differences, atmospheric
pollution undoubtedly plays an important part in causing a large number of deaths from bronchitis.