Electric car recharging station in Vancouver.

Clean Air

Our goal: Breathe the cleanest air of any major city in the world

As the city grows, we will continue to generate even more pollution. We are working in partnership with businesses, residents, and other levels of government to achieve our clean air target.

Read about the:

Progress we've made towards our 2020 target
Actions we will take between now and 2020
Recent successes that have moved us closer to our goals

Our target: Meet or beat the most stringent air quality guidelines from Metro Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and the World Health Organization

Progress we've made so far

Clean Air Chart

Hover on data points for more information on that year's performance.
To learn more about this metric, see the 'How We Measure Success' section below.

2015-2020 priority actions

Short-term actions for achieving our goals for 2020.
We have excellent air quality, but human health impacts can still occur at current pollutant levels. Now is the time to focus on the pollutants of most concern.
- 8.1 - Work with Metro Vancouver to ensure there are at least two permanent air quality stations within city limits.
- 8.2 - Develop an electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure strategy to support EV uptake.
- 8.3 - Investigate labeling gas pumps for their GHG and air quality impacts.
- 8.4 - Work with Metro Vancouver to ensure air quality data and information is available for sources and locations across the city.

Our successes

Read about our successes in the 2019-2020 Implementation Update Dashboard (531 KB)

How we measure success
The metrics for Clean Air rely on annual counts of total air-quality exceedances as measured at stations within Vancouver.

Air quality metrics are measured by Metro Vancouver from data collected at the Kitsilano and Robson Square monitoring stations in Vancouver.

Four indicators of air quality that are used for comparison to world standards are:
1. 24 hour average particulate matter (PM 2.5%) concentration >25 µg/m3
2. One hour average nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentration >200 µg/m3
3. 24 hour average sulfur dioxide (SO2) concentration >20 µg/m3
4. Eight hour ground-level ozone (O3) concentration >52 ppb
This metric is maintained by the Sustainability Group within the City Manager’s Office at the City. Measurement and data analysis is done by the Air Quality and Climate Change Planning group at Metro Vancouver Regional District.

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