<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;">The European Union’s executive arm will lay out plans to drastically cut pollution levels across the bloc, potentially eliminating more than 70% of the 300,000 premature deaths annually over the next decade, according to Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius.</span><br></div><div><br></div><div>The measures to be announced Wednesday by the European Commission will include an overhaul of the bloc’s air-pollution regulation, in an effort to bring the EU closer to guidelines laid out by the World Health Organization. That includes a target to cut the annual limit of fine particulate matter -- the main pollutant -- by more than half by the end of the decade.</div><div><br></div><div>“We want to set the EU on a trajectory for zero pollution in the air by 2050 at the latest,” Sinkevicius said in an interview. “Fresh air shouldn’t be a luxury in Europe.”</div><div><br></div><div>The proposals are expected to generate annual economic benefits of up to 121 billion euros ($120 billion) by the end of the decade from increased crop production, fewer lost work days and other factors.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>Citizens health issues linked to air pollution will be given the right to be compensated. Source: Hindustan Times</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>