Participatory biomonitoring of air quality

In 2015, the Chinese city of Xian installed a spectacular 60-metre-high air purifier to combat air pollution. A global concern, air pollution is generating citizen protests in France as much as in the former Celestial Empire, a sign of a shift in the mobilization of part of so-called civil society. At the end of 2017, the European Environment Agency opened a website so that everyone can find out about air quality in their own homes. The European Air Quality Index is based on five sources of pollutants: ozone (O ₃ ), sulfur dioxide (SO ₂ ), nitrogen dioxide (NO ₂ ) and health-damaging fine suspended particulates (PM 2.5 and PM 10). From the English "Particulate Matter", they refer to particles with aerodynamic diameters of less than 2.5 and 10 µm respectively. Citizens' demands are aimed at encouraging public authorities to implement measures to reduce the concentration of these pollutants. However, these mobilization logics respond to complex patterns in tension between the preservation of a common good and the protection of private interests, characterized by the expression "not in my backyard" (NIMBY – pas dans mon jardin). Against this backdrop, making decisions to improve air quality is a complex task. It requires integrating socio-technical factors on time and space scales that are difficult to reconcile with the singularity of social protests, accompanied, what's more, by controversial citizen metrology that doesn't meet current metrological standards. As a result, outdoor air quality has become a major public health issue, all too often focused by the media on pollution peaks, to the detriment of long-term consideration of compounds of proven toxicity. Thus, in 2016, French legislation strengthened the role of inter-municipalities, requiring them to act with citizens via multi-partner actions. Symbolizing these developments, the legislation now includes the "A" of Air issues in the new Plan climat-air-énergie territorial, better known by the acronym PCAET (formerly PCET). From a legal and technical point of view, however, the implementation of these laws faces a twofold problem. On the one hand, the various laws and action plans perpetuate a sectoralization that dissociates health, air, climate and social issues. On the other hand, the public service agents responsible for implementation and the implementers (local authorities, local businesses, the socio-professional sector linked to public action) are struggling to find coherence and real efficiency, both of which are bogged down in what is commonly referred to as the "institutional mille-feuille". It has to be said that there is still a massive lack of public involvement in all "air quality" measures, despite the constant...