ROME -- Italy has the worst diesel fume pollution in Europe along with Britain, with many Italian cities deemed as having illicit quantities of air pollution, new data from the Italian environmental association Legambiente reveals Friday.

 The grey layer of smog in main Italian cities is getting worse with the arrival of the cold season -- Turin and Venice are said to be particularly bad, also worsened by the added mix of traffic and heating.

 Many cities in the Bel Paese now have an air quality that is deemed illegal, as they are over the legal threshold for fine dust pollution, which is Pm10 (exceeding the limit 35 days a year with a concentration superior to 50 micrograms per square metre).

 The top five polluted cities in Italy according to Legambiente are -- Turin with 62 days that exceed the legal threshold, Frosinone with 59, Venice with 53, Milan with 52, and Padua with 50.

 “The causes of the smog are known and there are solutions,” said the Legambiente president Rossella Muroni, “we need a political will to put it into practice, as these figures risk rising in the winter months. One of the main points to confront is the transport within and out of the cities.”

 “Then we must abandon our dependency on fossil fuels, looking to renewable sources -- and invest in the restructuring of energy use in buildings, therefore guaranteeing a reduction in emissions from domestic heating.”

 These cities ranging from Turin to Naples are starting to take part in green initiatives to limit traffic amongst others. The Environmental Ministry’s plan provides a pack of measures linked to sustainable mobility.

 nkd