Oulu has been ranked as the European city with the cleanest air for the second year in a row.
The European Environment Agency’s (EEA) updated comparison includes 761 cities across Europe. Urban areas are ranked from cleanest to most polluted based on the risk of death associated with air pollution.
Five other Finnish cities also made the top 10: Jyväskylä, Tampere, Kuopio, Espoo and Lahti.
The comparison covers cities with more than 50,000 inhabitants where air quality is monitored.
According to the City of Oulu, measures to reduce emissions from transport and heating have contributed to the city’s good air quality. These include an extensive district heating network, public transport and investment in cycling infrastructure.
The increasing use of lower-emission fuels in both private and professional transport has also helped improve air quality, the city noted.
Oulu’s location far from Europe’s major cities and industrial areas also means that less air pollution is carried into the region from elsewhere.
Globally, air pollution is linked to one in eight deaths. In Finland, however, the risk of death associated with air pollution is relatively low.
