Postcode Air Quality Health Cost Calculator

The tool calls postcodes.io (ONS-backed Open Government Licence) to get the centroid coordinates and local authority, then matches the postcode area to a DEFRA AURN environment benchmark.

Each person in the household scales prescription, GP and QALY costs linearly. A 4-person family experiences roughly 4× the health cost of a single occupant at the same exposure.

Children under 5 apply a ×1.8 PM2.5 sensitivity multiplier (COMEAP cohort evidence). Asthma / COPD in the household applies ×2.3 to prescriptions and ×1.5 to GP visits.

A typical desk-working adult spends 1–2 hrs/day outdoors; an active parent or field-worker can be 4–8 hrs. The exposure multiplier is linear in hours outdoors (relative to an 8-hour baseline).

Walk and cycle apply an extra +30% active-travel multiplier on their share because higher breathing rate = higher inhaled dose per µg/m³. Rail and bus are modelled as the passive baseline; car sits between the two.

The Pollutants tab shows WHO ratios per pollutant (safe / caution / danger). The Cost tab breaks the monetised £/yr into prescriptions, GP visits and QALY. The Map tab shows the nearest DEFRA AURN stations so you can look up the actual live readings.

DEFRA’s Pollution Climate Mapping (PCM) model combines emissions inventories (road transport, industry, agriculture, domestic combustion) with meteorological data and ~170 AURN reference monitoring stations to produce 1km × 1km annual-mean maps of PM2.5, NO₂ and ozone across the UK. Each year’s map is verified against the AURN station readings. This tool’s area-type benchmarks are derived from the public PCM 1km annual summaries.

The Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants (COMEAP) is the UK’s statutory scientific advisor. Its 2018 and 2022 reviews quantify the long-term mortality burden of PM2.5 at ~29,000–36,000 equivalent UK deaths per year (0.8–1.1% of annual all-cause mortality), with NO₂ contributing an additional ~4,000–13,000 (after adjusting for PM2.5 overlap). The per-µg/m³ QALY-loss figures this tool uses are derived from the same cohort-study coefficients.

Clean Air Zones and ULEZ primarily target tailpipe NO₂ from older diesels. Post-2019 TfL data shows central London NO₂ down 44% at roadside monitors; inner London down ~20%. PM2.5 has fallen far less because secondary particulates (ammonium sulphate, nitrate aerosols formed downwind) and non-exhaust emissions (tyre wear, brake dust, resuspension) are not addressed by the charge. Policy direction is toward non-exhaust regulation (tyre abrasion limits from 2027) and wood-burning restrictions.

Indoor PM2.5 typically runs at 50–200% of outdoor PM2.5 depending on cooking (gas hobs ×2×3), wood-burning stoves (×5×10), candles / incense (×3), and window-leakage around busy roads. NO₂ is dominated by gas hob use indoors. The highest-ROI interventions for a roadside urban home are (1) extractor hood venting fully outside, (2) electric induction hob, (3) HEPA purifier in sleeping spaces, (4) carbon-filter MVHR if doing a retrofit.

The Environment Act 2021 sets a PM2.5 target of 10 µg/m³ by 2040 as a legal maximum annual-mean. That’s still 2× the WHO 2021 guideline. A 12 µg/m³ interim target for 2028 is under consultation. Most UK cities are on track for the 2028 figure but will require further interventions (wood-burning controls, non-exhaust emission caps, electrified freight) to hit 2040 across the board. For a 20-year homeowning horizon, any inner-urban postcode is likely to stay above WHO 2021 for PM2.5 but should converge on WHO for NO₂ by 2035.