According to the EU Zero Pollution Dashboard published today, fifteen regions across Austria, Finland, France, Germany and Sweden show the lowest pollution levels in the EU.

European regions have been investing in environmental protection, using EU funding to modernise and maintain water and wastewater infrastructure, promote sustainable mobility, tackle air and noise pollution, and adopt nature-based solutions through ecological restoration.

These actions, driven by EU environmental legislation, contribute to the zero pollution ambition and to global efforts on One Health, which links human, animal and plant health to the status of the environment.

The progress towards a better environment

The 2021 EU Zero Pollution Action Plan introduced flagship initiatives to achieve clean air, water and soil across the EU, including through a scoreboard on regional and urban environmental performance.

The dashboard, alongside the Zero Pollution Monitoring and Outlook report and the Fourth Clean Air Outlook, allows progress to be monitored over time and regions to be compared with each other and the EU average, and it is a first step towards a scoreboard. The comparison is based on several environmental pollution indicators that address health, ecosystem protection and biodiversity, as well as production and consumption.

The data demonstrates significant progress achieved so far:

  • 15 regions across five Member States have already achieved low pollution levels compared to EU averages based on the indicators available;
  • 97% of regions have improved their air quality since 2016;
  • 75% of regions reduced industrial emissions between 2017 and 2021.

However, pollution levels remain too high, and progress is often too slow to meet the targets and limit values set by the EU, as outlined in the Zero Pollution Monitoring and Outlook Report.