The Role of Vegetation in Local and Urban Air Quality

We present the outcome of the international conference ‘Local Air Quality and its Interactions with Vegetation’, which took place in Antwerp, Belgium on January 21-22, 2010. Results of international CFD studies, measurement campaigns and experimental studies show that vegetation can have an important effect on dispersion patterns determining local air quality. However, there are many parameters involved (vegetation structure, local meteorology, urban canopy characteristics, mechanical turbulence properties) and the results show that the complexity of the mechanisms of vegetation affecting local air quality are often underestimated.