Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the levels of pollution in and around Sheffield Midland train station.

Sheffield City Council has been identified in the UK plan for tackling roadside nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentrations as a local authority with concentrations of NO2 projected to be persistently in exceedance of the legal limit in locations on the A57, A61 and A630. The Government is working with Sheffield City Council and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council to produce a local air quality plan to reduce these levels of NO2 in the shortest possible time.

The UK Plan also sets out information on annual nitrogen oxide emissions from other transport such as rail. At a national level, emissions from the rail sector are relatively low; however the Government is committed to reducing them further. Recent train operating franchises that the Department for Transport has negotiated include commitments to replace older diesel units with new units compliant with the latest emission standards (through the Non-Road Mobile Machinery Directive) which have become progressively more stringent over time for both NO2 and particulate matter emissions.

You can find Sheffield City Council’s air quality information on its website https://www.sheffield.gov.uk/home/pollution-nuisance/air-quality.