Cars should retire after 10: Dubai Municipality

Dubai, Mar 7 (UNI) The Dubai Municipality has suggested a 10-year retirement for vehicles on the Dubai Roads.

This comes after a study conducted under the project called 'On-road Vehicle Emission Measurement Using Remote Sensing Device' (RSD) on Dubai roads, which was conducted by the civic body officials.

The project, which had been on for 10 months, has revealed that the vehicle pollution in Dubai is around 13 per cent (for vehicles using petrol). The study also showed the pollution rate of vehicles using diesel in Dubai stood at around 19 per cent.

Engineer Redha Hassan Salman, Head of Environmental Protection and Safety Section in the Environment Department of Dubai Municipality, said the higher emission of pollutants in Dubai was attributed to the high temperature, which goes up to 47.5 degree Celsius.

''Based on the study, we suggest retirement of vehicles on Dubai roads after 10 years as a feasible step to reduce pollution,'' Mr Salman told Khaleej Times.

He noted that emission measurement was evaluated for both public and private sectors for Dubai-and non-Dubai-licenced vehicles covering taxis, buses (public transport, schools, and labourers), heavy vehicles such as trucks and trailers, and private and public cars, in addition to the age of motor vehicles and fuel fleet usage.

''Two factors point to the worsening air pollution situation in Dubai. They are the rapid pace of urbanisation and motorisation,'' Mr Salman explained.

''Vehicles in Dubai take 3.1 million trips a day, which is expected to increase to 13.1 million trips a day by the year 2020.

This is precisely the reason behind embarking on such a project to know the percentage of vehicles exceeding the emission limit compared to other countries of the world,'' the official added.

UNI XC RJ AS2014