Can Plants Reduce Urban Pollution?

Effectiveness of Green Infrastructure for Improvement of Air Quality in Urban Street Canyons (Abstract, Thomas A. M. Pugh, A. Robert MacKenzie, J. Duncan Whyatt, and C. Nicholas Hewitt, Environ. Sci. Technol., Jun. 4, 2012)

Also discussed here: Green Plants Reduce City Street Pollution Up to Eight Times More Than Previously Believed (ScienceDaily, Jul. 18, 2012)

The question whether trees  reduce or add to urban pollution is frequently debated with the answer seeming to be that in a highly polluted atmosphere, some coniferous trees add aromatic gases to the mix. Today we review an interesting article that suggests that foliage (not trees) will absorb pollution through  their plant surface which is more effective than the hard surfaces that make up street canyons – with reductions of 40-60% in terms of the concentrations of NO2 and PM.

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