Lagos State has been ranked as the 133th in the world’s most polluted cities.
According to IQAir, Lagos, with an estimated population of the metropolitan area was 21 million people as of 2018, has the concentration of its PM2.5 pollutant as 73.2 µg/m³.
It also reported that Lagos was “experiencing some fairly bad quality air with a US AQI number of 160 which classed it as ‘unhealthy’ according to recommended figures from the World Health Organization” at the beginning of 2021 in its 2022 Global Air Quality Report on most polluted city ranking.
According to the report, the major source of air pollution in Lagos comes from vehicle emissions, closely followed by industry and domestic energy use.
“Every day, 227 vehicles clog each kilometre of road. Most of these vehicles are over 15 years old and are not equipped with the latest emission technologies. The fuel they use has a very high sulphur content which is 200 times higher than U.S. standards for diesel,” the report says.
Also, Nigeria is the 10th most polluted country in Africa, with an air pollution rate of 44.8 per cent, followed by Uganda and Ethiopia.
