ISSUES ON AIR POLLUTION IN MALAYSIA

Razak Ghazali
‘Department of Civil Environmental Engineering
University Tun Hussien Onn Malaysia’.

Abstract
Now day, resources and minimal development pressures, little consideration was paid to grow natural worry in Malaysia.
The haze scenes in Asia forced dangers to the natural administration of Malaysia and expanded attention to our
environment. As a result from the pollution, the legislature set up Malaysian Air Quality Guidelines, the Haze Action
Plan and Air Pollution Index to enhance air quality. Air quality observing is a piece of the underlying methodology in the
contamination counteractive action program in Malaysia. Survey of air contamination in Malaysia depends on the reports
of the air quality observing in a few expansive urban communities in Malaysia. The air contamination comes for the most
part from transportation, modern discharges, and open burning sources. Among of them, transportation contributes the
most to air contamination in Malaysia.

Keywords: Air contamination, Air quality, little consideration, Urban communities

1. Introduction
Malaysian ought to be thankful on the grounds that Fig. 1. Sources of air pollution in Malaysia, 1996.
has been feature one with fresh oxygen urban Source: Department of the Environment (1997).
circumstances in Asia. The goal of achieving present
day country status by the year 2020 and the related
quick financial advancement have started to
contamination and the corruption of condition.
Utilization of fisheries, air and water defilement, and
contamination by present day misuses have ended
up being more veritable in Malaysia lately. Among
them, air pollution is the huge issue that has been
affecting human prosperity, cultivating harvests, and
forest species. The result data and focuses on
encompassing air quality exhibit that a part of the air
harms in a couple of immense urban groups are
extending with time and are not by and large at
satisfactory levels according to the national Air pollution like mobile/vehicle sources, stationary
including air quality models. This study case has sources and open burning sources is major source
been run to know the issue about air quality contamination in Malaysia. For as far back as 5 years,
observing and concentrates identified with air emissions from mobile sources has been the major
contamination in Malaysia. source of air pollution, adding to no less than 70-75
percent of the aggregate air pollution. The emission
2. Sources of air pollution from stationary sources for the most part have added
to 20-25 percent of the air pollution, while the open
burning and forest fire have contributed roughly 3-5
percent. As shown in figure 1.

The category in Mobile sources like a personal cars,

business vehicles and motor bikes. In Malaysia the
state have a highest vehicle population like Kuala
Lumpur followed by Johor, Selangor, Perak and
Pulau Pinang. These conditions have caused serious
blockage in all parts of the highway system and halls,
particularly in the focal business territories and Sarawak, Johor, Sabah, Perak, and Pahang.
definitely the environment in these zones has Expanded action from the modern division has been
crumbled because of fumes emanations from joined by an expanded utilization of vitality and
vehicles. The Department Of Environment has others activity. Most of the small and mid-sized
found that after the economic downturn of 1986- industries don't install pollution control equipment
1988, the quantity of enlisted vehicles expanded at a on their factory. This problem have increases the
quicker rate from a 3.3 percent expansion in 1987 to emission of pollutants, particularly in the industrial
areas, which in some cases contributes specific
9.5 percent expansion in 1990. In the same time, the pollutants to the air. Moreover, small industries are
study uncovered that the level of air pollutants in generally located in populated village areas where
Selangor and Kuala Lumpur is expanded quickly emission control is more problematic. To reduce this
after the monetary subsidence. As we know that in problem, the External Quality Assessment (EQA)
Malaysia, private car are the most critical cause of lists the following standards for stack gas emissions
environmental pollutants. They contribute around 75 (Table2).
percent of the total CO and SPM and also around 76
to 79 percent of the oxides of sulphur and nitrogen
(DOE 1991). Our government has establishing act a
rule to make slow a pollutant that is two recent
accomplishment will reduce the negative effect of
portable sources on air quality, the endorsement of
new natural direction corrections the Environment
Quality Act (EQA) and the eliminate of leaded
gasoline sales. A critical initial move toward
actualizing Malaysia's Clean Air Plan was
accomplished in 1996 with the endorsement of two
directions intended to diminish emanations from
versatile sources: The Environmental Quality
(Control of Emissions from Diesel Engines)
Regulations 1996 and the Environmental Quality
(Control of Emissions from Petrol Engines)
Regulations 1996. This problem solving is new
directions center on counteractive action by
controlling vehicular emanations at the assembling
or gathering stage. The outflows principles in the
new directions is rely on the European Economic The open burning sources of air pollution in
Commission on Standards. The across the country Malaysia include the burning of solid wastes and
retail offer of leaded gas has been declining as a forest fires. This issues usually at certain with
level of aggregate deals in the course of recent years, incorrect method managed disposal sites and results
as shown in Table 1. This decreased piece of the pie in smoke as well as fly ash problems. A few years
joined with the accessibility of suitable added ago between July and September significant
substances has permitted fuel providers to consent to amounts of particle matter have been transported by
stop the offers of leaded gas by and large. Formally, south-westerly winds from a neighbour our country
all oil organizations in Malaysia must stop the due to uncontrolled large biomass burning activities.
creation and offer of leaded fuel by the year 2000. From that problem, peninsular Malaysia, Sabah, and
Lessened leaded gas deals are accepted to be in Sarawak in 1991, in 1994, and, most recently, during
charge of an unfaltering abatement in lead levels all September and October of 1997 serious haze events
through the western side of peninsular Malaysia. has been recorded in. In 1997 haze from large-scale
Throughout the following couple of years, this forest and plantation fires, particularly in southern
decreasing might be balanced by the expansion in Sumatra and central Kalimantan, the problem both
the sheer number of engine vehicles out, especially in Indonesia. Haze conditions also increased serious
in urban zones. from local emissions. At its worst, the haze limits
visibility to less than 500 m and produces respirable
In industry, control stations, modern fuel consuming
particles of concentrations up to 500 g/m3 (five
procedures, and residential fuel consuming has been
times the level considered unhealthy).
identified are stationary sources. The vast majority
of the stationary sources in Malaysia live in Selangor,
trailed by a noteworthy number of sources in
3. Air quality in Malaysia
Air quality standards has been identify individual
pollutants and the concentrations at which they
become harmful to the public health and also to the
environment. The standards are typically set without
regard to economic feasibility for attainment.
Instead, they focus on public health, including the
health of “sensitive” populations such as asthmatics,
children, the elderly, public welfare, and including
protection against decreased visibility and damage
to animals, crops, vegetation, aquatic resources, and
buildings. The Malaysian air pollution index (API)
is obtained from the measurement of fine particles
(below 10 μm) and several gases like carbon
monoxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide.
Table 3 shows the API in Malaysia. Based on API
readings throughout the country, the air quality has
been considered generally good. In the urban
environment of the Klang Valley, the index also has
generally been between good and moderate, except
for serious haze in September and October. The bad
air days of 1997 combined with the hosting of the
Commonwealth Games in September 1998 provided
as incentive for the installation of eight more air
quality monitoring stations, bringing the new total to
39. Table 4 lists the recommended Malaysian Air
Quality Guidelines (Standards rule) and compares
them with the National Ambient Air Quality
Standards currently enforced in the United States
and WHO guidelines. The Malaysian guidelines are
fairly consistent with the standards of the United
States’.
4. Air quality monitoring
Long time ago in Malaysia, development and growth
were not planned, they were initiated according to
the people needs and pressures of the time.
Consequently, this haphazard development has
resulted in negative impacts on the environment as a
whole and on air quality in particular (Sham, 1994).
Earlier, Sham (1979) pointed out that the
atmospheric pollution problem is becoming more
serious, as there is always a potential for the
occurrence of inversion in the valley. In many
problem has come out, the government enacted into
law the Environmental Quality Act in 1974,
subsequently, the Division of the Environment was
established and the Clean Air Regulations were
formerly gazetted in 1978.
The main "long haul" air quality observing task
accentuating suspended particulate and sulfur
dioxide was completed by the DOE and the
Meteorological Service Department (MMS) at the
mechanical and private zones in Petaling Jaya in
1978. After effects of the examination,
recommended that the suspended particulates
surpassed 93 percent of the time in the mechanical
zone (the already proposed standard was a 24-h
normal of 100 μg/m3) and 95 percent of the time in
the private zone (the then-proposed standard was 50
μg/m3 (DOE, 1997). Sulfur dioxide was by and
large low close to the modern site. In April 1995,
Alam Sekitar Malaysia Sdn Bhd (ASMA) was
granted a 20-year privatization admission to
introduce, work, and keep up a system of 50
consistent air quality checking stations (and 10
water stations) all through Malaysia for the DOE.
Alam Sekitar Malaysia Sdn Bhd (ASMA)
additionally deals with the Environmental Data
Center, which gives natural information to the DOE
and other invested individuals. In 1996, 10 new
completely robotized encompassing air quality
observing stations with telemetric frameworks were
introduced, bringing the aggregate number of
stations up to 31.
5. Health impacts of air pollution in
Malaysia
If we get long exposure to air pollution, this can
affect us with short-term and long-term effect. In the
short term, high levels of air pollution lead to an
acute condition to living things. Besides that,
blockage of sunlight may promote the spread of
harmful bacteria and viruses that would otherwise be
killed by ultraviolet B (Beardsley et al., 1997). The
possible long-term health effects of exposure to air
pollution are difficult and unknown to detect.
Components of haze, including polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons, are known carcinogens the effects of
which may not be apparent for years. The
implication may be more severe for children, for
whom the particulates inhaled are high relative to
body size and low antibody. There are a very limited
number of research that relate air pollution to its
health impact in Malaysia. The lack of data
gathering for environmental epidemiological
analysis makes it difficult to estimate the health
impact of air pollution. Recent research in this
country have examined possible health effects of the
1997 forest fires. For example, outpatient visits in
Kuching district, Sarawak increased between two
and three times during the peak period of smoke
haze and respiratory disease outpatient visits to
Kuala Lumpur General Hospital increased from 250
to 800 per day (World Health Organization, 1998).
Data were assembled that show an increase in cases
of asthma, acute respiratory infection, and
conjunctivitis during August–September 1997 at a
number of major hospitals in Kuala Lumpur (Brauer,
M., and Jamal, H.H., 1998). For respiratory diseases,
Selangor recorded a significant increase in the
number of cases during the September haze. Asthma
cases increased from 912 in June to more than 5000
in September. The total number of acute respiratory
infection cases increased from about 6000 to more
than 30,000 during the same period. Apart from
respiratory diseases, conjunctivitis increased
significantly during the haze period. In Selangor, the
total number of increased from only 207 cases in
June to as high as 3496 cases in October. The same
trend was observed in Sarawak. In addition, the daily
incidence of conjunctivitis in Sarawak during
September was found to have a positive correlation
with the API (representing PM10 concentration).
However, the number of cases gradually decreased
toward the June value as the concentration of
PM10 began to decrease after September. When the
air quality was almost back to the values of a non-
haze period in October, the number of cases returned
to normal. The trend show that short-term exposure
to high levels of PM10 was detrimental to human
health (Awang et al., 2000). Effects were found to
be greatest in children, the elderly, and people with
pre-existing respiratory problem, youngsters are
among the most resistant. A survey carried out
among secondary school children in Kuala Lumpur
and Klang revealed that less than 50 percent of these
school children sought medical treatment each time
they fell sick (Awang et al., 2000).
6. Air pollution studies in Malaysia
A several studies has been conducted on air
pollution in Malaysia. In recent years, the Malaysian
air quality was control by the occurrence of dense
haze. From July to October in 1997, Malaysia was
badly affected by smoke haze caused by land and
forest fires around us. Previous incidents of severe
haze in our country was reported in April 1983
(Chow and Lim, 1983), August 1990 (Cheang,
1991; Sham, 1991), June and October 1991 (Cheang,
1991), and August to October 1994 (Yap, 1995).
The severity and extent of the 1997 smoke haze
pollution were unprecedented, affecting some 300
million people across the region. The actual amount
of economic losses suffered by countries in the
region during this environmental disaster were
enormous and are yet to be fully determined during
non-haze episodes, vehicular emissions accounted
for more than 70 percent of the total emissions in the
urban areas. Air quality studies that has been
conducted in the Klang Valley during the non-haze
episodes between 1986 and 1989, December 1991 to
November 1992, and January 1995 to December
1997 show two distinct daily peaks in the diurnal
variations in the concentrations of the sulfur dioxide,
nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, and particulate
matter. The morning hour top was expected
primarily to vehicle emanations and at night crest
was credited for the most part to meteorological
conditions, including air soundness and wind speed.
Total suspended particulate matter was the main
pollutant, the concentrations at a few place in the
Klang Valley often exceeded the Recommended
Malaysian Air Quality Guidelines. A cooperation
study conducted by the Department of the
Environment (DOE), Japan International
Cooperation Agency (JICA), the Malaysian
Meteorological Service (MOSTI), and University
Putra Malaysia (UPM) between December to
August 1993 gave clear indications that air pollution
in the Klang Valley was becoming so worse. This
study also indicated that if no effective
countermeasures were introduced, the emissions of
sulfur oxides (SO), nitrogen oxides (NO), particulate
matter, hydrocarbons, and also carbon monoxides
(CO) in the year 2005 would increase by 1.4, 2.12,
1.47, and 2.7 times, respectively, the 1992 levels
(Awang et al., 1997).
7. Conclusions
Air is important to all the living things that exist this
earth, but lately, the air we've been living is slowly
tainted by human behaviour. The issue about air
pollution has been conducted in Malaysia long time
ago, in my writing I just state some chapter like (1)
Sources of air pollution, (2) Air quality in Malaysia,
(3) Air quality monitoring, (4) Health impact of air
pollution in Malaysia, and (5) Air pollution studies
in Malaysia .It is already 23 years since the
Environmental Quality (Clean Air) Regulations
1978 were introduced in our country. Many cause
come our this problem. First thing first it from our
attitude only we just follow our heart only when do
something we don’t think long what kind us do and
we only know to build our country only but we don’t
see what happen in our environment in other word
we are selfish. So we as the people that
is considerate, should sensitive what happen in
around day by day, year by year, because this earth
is old to cruel.
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