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Measurement of. Atmospheric Pollution
The Council maintains standard deposit gauges and lead dioxide candles at
Birkbeck Avenue, Greenford, and at Longfield Depot at the rear of the Town Hall.
These gauges and candles provide information which is of local interest only and
serve to indicate the level of pollution in the immediate areas concerned. The deposit
bowls and candles are changed monthly and the results are determined by a private
analyst.
In addition there are three sets of equipment which provide daily measurements of
smoke and sulphur dioxide by the volumetric system. These are located at the Town
Hall, at Eliots Green Grammar School, Northolt, and at Walpole Grammar School,
Ealing. The results obtained from these instruments are submitted to the Warren
Spring Laboratory of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.
Early in the year the Director of the Laboratory informed the Council that it had
been decided to include in the national survey, all towns in England and Wales with a
population of more than 100,000. The Council's existing arrangements for the measurements
of smoke and sulphur dioxide fulfilled all their requirements. Ealing would
therefore be included in the list of representative towns for the purpose of analysing
the results to give a comprehensive picture of airborne pollution throughout the
country.
The tables and graphs in the following pages give details of the monthly results
from the deposit gauges and lead dioxide candles, and the monthly average, which is
the means of the "daily average" figures for smoke and sulphur dioxide, obtained
from the volumetric apparatus.
The photographs of the deposit gauge, the lead dioxide candle, and the daily
volumetric apparatus, which appear on the graphs, are 'Crown Copyright' and are
published by permission of the Director of Warren Spring Laboratory of the Department
of Scientific and Industrial Research.
Dark Smoke from Industrial Premises
The adoptive Section 47 of the Middlesex County Council Act, 1961, was brought
into force in the Borough, by special resolution of the Council, and took effect as
from 1st September, 1962. This Section prohibits the emission of dark smoke from any
industrial premises in the district and provides penalties for contraventions. The
Section does not apply to smoke emitted from any chimney of a building or from a
chimney to which Section 1 of the Clean Air Act, 1956, applies, nor to dark smoke
accidentally or inadvertently emitted if all practicable steps have been taken to prevent
or minimise the emission of such smoke, nor to premises controlled under the Alkali,
etc., Works Regulations Act, 1906. With these exceptions, the Section will prove most
useful in dealing with conditions which might arise, especially in smoke control
areas, from the burning of large quantities of waste material in the open, and closes
a serious loophole in the provisions of the Clean Air Act. Several occasions have arisen
where the attention of possible offenders has been drawn to the Section, but no
formal action has so far been necessary.
This Section is much stronger in its effect than Section 16 of the Clean Air Act,
1956, which makes it necessary for the local authority to prove that a nuisance is
being caused to the inhabitants of the neighbourhood, where smoke, other than that
dealt with in other Sections of the Act, is produced.
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