Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the level of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) emissions from industry and power generation in Weaver Vale and Halton constituencies.

The information requested for Weaver Vale and Halton constituencies is not held centrally and to obtain it in the time available would incur disproportionate costs. If the hon. Member wishes to write to the Environment Agency it will be able to provide the information.

For the industrial sites the Environment Agency regulates through the permitting regime, it regularly monitors compliance with permit emission limits:

• By regular inspections and audits for compliance assessment, including the regulation of emissions monitoring;
• By requiring a management-systems approach that makes implementation, auditing and compliance assessment straightforward;
• By specifying accredited and certified measurement services and equipment, and auditing to ensure compliance;
• By banding operators according to risk and performance, to ensure a focused, cost-effective application of effective, proportionate and fair regulation;
• By tracking the performance of operators and taking action where appropriate.

In addition to the permitting regime, for each permit the operator must report the amount of emissions of each controlled substance every year to the Environment Agency under the Pollution Inventory (PI). The PI provides information about the releases and transfers of substances from the industrial activities we regulate. This helps:

• Provide the public with easy access to environmental information from industrial activities in their locality;
• Protect the environment by providing information to assist us in developing regulation;
• Government to meet its national and international environmental reporting commitments, such as the European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register.