Shina Ansari said Sunday at an air pollution management conference held at the Meteorological Organization that the Clean Air Law, approved by Parliament in 2017, remains the country’s most important upstream legal framework on air pollution. Under Article 2 of the law, the Department of Environment oversees implementation, while more than 20 executive bodies have defined responsibilities for compliance.

She added that, alongside scrapping aging vehicle fleets, electrification programs are also a key measure to reduce air pollution. In addition to deploying electric buses and taxis, a program to replace 20,000 aging motorcycles in Tehran with electric models has begun. The plan is being implemented through financial incentives tied to fuel-saving certificates.

Ansari said power plant fuel is another important issue. While mobile sources are the primary contributors to air pollution in Tehran and Mashhad, stationary sources account for a significant share in cities such as Arak. In 2024, under a resolution by the National Air Pollution Reduction Task Force, low-sulfur mazut was supplied to the Shazand power plant. As a result, the number of unhealthy days caused by sulfur dioxide pollution declined from 27 days in 1402 to five days in 1403.

She said this outcome prompted the Department of Environment to coordinate with the Oil Ministry to supply 420 million liters of low-sulfur mazut this year to four power plants located within residential areas, particularly during periods of severe air pollution. Efforts are also underway to enable mazut desulfurization using knowledge-based companies. The selected project is currently being implemented at one of the country’s refineries.

Ansari also pointed to progress in reducing gas flaring, saying several million cubic meters of flaring have been cut. She added that the Department of Environment, in cooperation with the Oil Ministry, is pursuing further reductions, particularly in oil-producing provinces such as Khuzestan and Bushehr.