A large portion of households in EU countries continue using sold fuels (coal and wood) for space heating. In Poland alone the number of single family houses using coal and wood for heating exceeds 4 million buildings. Low quality coal and wood remain the cheapest source of heat energy. They are often mixed with waste, which significantly aggravates the problem and health effects. As the problem of air pollution concerns all EU countries it requires applying a transnational approach including, cooperation between the countries, experience sharing and development of joint measures. Not only because the sources of air pollution and required solutions to the problem are similar, but also because air pollution has a strong transboundary character. Project partners come mainly from one of the most serious European hot spots, i.e. CEE area. Participation of Spain will allow for diffusion of project products and results to other parts of the EU, beyond CEE. The objective of this project is to raise awareness of rural communities in the countries covered by the project about the problem of air pollution, its reasons, health effects and possible solutions that can be taken by inhabitants in order to mitigate the problem and reduce local air pollution. This objective will be achieved by providing training for teachers from rural areas in the topic of air pollution and equipping them with education materials that they will use to teach their pupils and students about the problem. The project focuses on rural areas due to the fact that public awareness of the problem is much lower among rural communities compared with inhabitants of larger cities. Therefore, the project responds to awareness and education gap that is the most serious within rural areas.
A large portion of households in EU countries continue using sold fuels (coal and wood) for space heating. In Poland alone the number of single family houses using coal and wood for heating exceeds 4 million buildings. Low quality coal and wood remain the cheapest source of heat energy. They are often mixed with waste, which significantly aggravates the problem and health effects. As the problem of air pollution concerns all EU countries it required applying a transnational approach including, cooperation between the countries, experience sharing and development of joint measures. Not only because the sources of air pollution and required solutions to the problem are similar, but also because air pollution has a strong transboundary character. Project partners came mainly from one of the most serious European hot spots, i.e. CEE area. Participation of Spain allowed dissemination of project products and results to other parts of the EU, beyond CEE. The objective of this project was to raise awareness of rural communities in the countries covered by the project about the problem of air pollution, its reasons, health effects and possible solutions that can be taken by inhabitants in order to mitigate the problem and reduce local air pollution. This objective was achieved by providing training for teachers from rural areas in the topic of air pollution and equipping them with education materials that they will use to teach their pupils and students about the problem. The project focused on rural areas due to the fact that public awareness of the problem is much lower among rural communities compared with inhabitants of larger cities. Therefore, the project responded to awareness and education gap that is the most serious within rural areas.