SPATIAL AMBIENT AIR QUALITY ANALYSIS AND ITS EFFECTS ON THE TRAFFIC POLICE OFFICERS WITHIN THE CENTRAL BUSINESS DISTRICT IN NAIROBI, KENYA

Abstract

Every person in Kenya is entitled to a clean and healthy environment. This includes the access to the various public elements or segments of the environment for recreational, educational, health, spiritual and cultural purposes. As a practice, the traffic police officers (TPO’s) spend most of their time on the road controlling traffic a routine that exposes them to automobile emissions. This study was therefore carried out to investigate the levels of exposure to automobile emissions and to determine the health effects of exposure. Emissions of carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2) and oxides of nitrogen (NOx) from vehicles in the Central Business District in Nairobi were sampled. A gas aspiration pump AP-20 together with detector tubes were used to determine the levels of NOx, CO emissions while Testo 435 multi-function measuring instrument was used to determine CO2 levels, wind velocity and temperature at ten purposely selected sites within the Central Business District. The results showed that CO2, CO and NOx sampled had means of 634.80 parts per million (ppm), 12.74 ppm and 2.56 ppm respectively. These results demonstrated that the TPO’s were exposed to CO, CO2 and NOx levels that were above the recommended occupational exposure limits-control limit for the gases according to Legal Notice No. 60 of 2007 (GOK, 2007).