CONCENTRATIONS of carbon dioxide (CO2) reached a potentially harmful 47.9 micrograms per cubic meter (µg/m3) in Farnham’s The Borough last year – according to analysis of new council data by Farnham-based air quality expert David Harvey.

The figure is believed to set an unwelcome new record for The Borough, and exceeds the national annual mean objective of 40 µg/m3. It is also the exact same figure speculated by Mr Harvey at last September’s Farnham Pollution Summit, co-hosted by MP Jeremy Hunt and the Herald.

However, despite the spike – it has emerged that Waverley Borough Council has relocated the offending ‘WBC9’ diffusion tube in The Borough, inviting criticism from Mr Harvey and Mr Hunt.

In emails to the former, Waverley’s deputy environmental health manager Jeanette Guy explained that, while CO2 breached the annual objective in The Borough in 2019, no breaches of the short-term one-hour 200 µg/m3 objective were recorded. As “members of the public are unlikely to spend one hour in the vicinity of WBC9”, she added CO2 is not deemed to pose a significant risk to health in The Borough.

Instead, Waverley confirmed it has relocated the monitoring tube to outside Preferred Travel at 25 The Borough – but Mr Harvey has argued that given the scale of the problem in the town centre, and The Borough in particular, the council “should be putting in more tubes, not removing them”.

Citing Waverley’s removal of a tube from another pollution hotspot in Wrecclesham Road last year, he added: “The public will think you have moved it to avoid having to address the air quality problem that it is indicating.”

In “total agreement” with Mr Harvey, South West Surrey MP, Mr Hunt said: “It is totally the wrong solution to the problem to stop measuring it. People in Farnham all know there is a pollution problem in The Borough and will be very concerned that Waverley is behaving this way.

“The best and only solution is to deal with the traffic creating the noxious fumes. Waverley must reverse this decision.”

Responding, Waverley leader John Ward said monitoring locations are “regularly reviewed” in line with Defra guidelines, but confirmed he has asked for “monitoring at the current location to continue”, pending further investigation of Mr Harvey’s concerns.

The Farnham Residents councillor added: “The suggestion to move one of the two diffusion tubes located on The Borough, was made by the Farnham Air Quality Working Group, who felt that exposure to pollution levels would be higher in the new location at number 25.”