Political Context
The Political Context of ICP Modelling & MappingAt the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, concluded 1975 in Helsinki, European states recognized the increasing threat and international nature of air pollution. The participating states affirmed the aim to cooperate more closely in the fields of research and development, and the implementation of pollution control strategies, when they adopted the Final Act. In 1979 the Signatory Parties adopted the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP). The LRTAP Convention entered into force in 1983. The goal of the LRTAP Convention is to control air pollution and its effects and to develop a programme for the monitoring and evaluation the long-range transport of air pollutants. The Convention calls for the exchange of information and the coordination of research activities in order to develop control strategies to combat air pollution. It specifies, besides others, the need to initiate and coordinate research and development of monitoring and measuring of air pollutants. It also calls for improving models for a better understanding of the transmission of air pollutants, and the effects of sulphur compounds and other major air pollutants on human health and the environment. Since 1984, eight protocols for controlling sulphur, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, heavy metals, persistent organic pollutants and abating acidification, eutrophication and ground-level ozone have been adopted under the Convention. In 1988 the Working Group on Effects (WGE) established the Task Force on Mapping, later renamed to ICP Modelling and Mapping of Critical Loads & Levels and Air Pollution Effects, Risks and Trends (ICP Modelling & Mapping) to develop an effects-based approach for implementing the Convention. The ICP Modelling & Mapping conducts research jointly with other ICPs and the Task Force on Health under the WGE to support the LRTAP Convention�s goals of monitoring and controlling transboundary air pollutants. The ICP Modelling & Mapping particularly fulfils the requirements from Article 7(d) and 8(f) of the LRTAP Convention. Article 7(d) of the Convention states that research should be conducted into the effects of sulphur compounds, and other major air pollutants, on the environment, including agriculture, forestry, natural vegetation, aquatic ecosystems and materials. Article 7 further emphasizes the development of dose-response relationships designed to protect the environment. Article 8(f) calls for exchanging available physico-chemical and biological data relating to the effects of long-range transboundary air pollution and the extent of the damage that can be attributed to long-range transboundary air pollution. |
