Breathing Space : The Natural
and Unnatural History of Air
by Mark Everard
(Zed Books, £24.99)

AIR is the only necessity of life that hasn’t yet been privatised and put up for sale. It is also taken for granted as something that is always there for birds and insects to fly in and present in the winds that transport pollen and seeds and bring us rain.

And it is there also in the beauty of the eternally changing sky above us.

In Breathing Space, Mark Everard argues persuasively that we can no longer take our air for granted and that it needs care and protection just as our oceans and our landscapes do.

Air and the wider atmosphere are vital in protecting us from solar radiation, maintaining climate and weather patterns, dispersing water and as an alternative source of energy and a carrier of seeds and pollen — all vital for the health of the planet’s vegetation.

When the front page of London’s Evening Standard carries the headline: “Air too toxic to jog in city” and the City Corporation’s public protection director warns that strenuous exercise could seriously harm you, alarm bells should start ringing about what is happening to our atmosphere.

We read and hear much about threats to the world’s rainforests and oceans but little about the world’s atmosphere, a key component of the natural cycles governing the life of our planet.

And we remain very much in the dark about how dangerous levels of highly toxic substances like dioxin and other airborne pollutants such as radiation affect both plant and animal welfare as well as human life. Everard here attempts to remedy that gap in our knowledge.

He’s served on numerous government advisory and expert groups in Britain as well as advising other governments and knows what he is talking about. He argues passionately that just as countries are now beginning to work together towards regulation of the land and marine environments, we urgently need proper international regulation of the atmosphere and airspace, emphasising that we must integrate air into the wider environmental discourse.

His book is the first to attempt to do this and, as such, is an essential read.