The Lower Hunter region is located along the NSW east coast, about 120km north-north-east of Sydney. It includes the city of Newcastle and the Port of Newcastle, the largest bulk shipping port on the east coast of Australia and one of largest coal export ports in the world. Our air quality monitoring in the Lower Hunter region includes 2 larger networks, being the Lower Hunter Air Quality Monitoring network in suburban areas and the Newcastle Local Air Quality Monitoring network in the centre of Newcastle.
We also conduct air quality monitoring in the Lake Macquarie region, at Morisset station, and at Wyong in the peri-urban region of the Central Coast.
Download the network site information (XLSX 44KB).
The Lower Hunter Air Quality Monitoring Network
Monitoring stations at Newcastle, Beresfield and Wallsend make up the Lower Hunter Air Quality Monitoring Network.
The Newcastle Local Air Quality Monitoring Network
The monitoring stations at Carrington, Mayfield and Stockton make up the Newcastle Local Air Quality Monitoring Network.
These stations were set up in 2014, following studies by the then OEH (now DPE) and the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) and advice from NSW Health’s Air Pollution Expert Advisory Committee.
The station locations were nominated by the Newcastle Community Consultative Committee on the Environment.
To comply with statutory requirements, data from these fully industry-funded stations is not included in the reports that DPE publishes.
Reporting
- Current monitoring results from the Central Coast
- Lower Hunter and Newcastle Local Air Quality Monitoring Network map - displays current air quality conditions across the network
- Search historical data.
Hourly reports
Using data from the stations at Newcastle, Beresfield, Wallsend and Wyong, we provide hourly values of pollutant concentrations. Carrington, Mayfield and Stockton stations are fully industry-funded and the measurements are available from the datafeed map.
Annual reports
You can find more air-quality information for the Newcastle and Central Coast region in the department's annual air-quality monitoring reports.
Newsletters
Seasonal air quality newsletters are published for the Newcastle and Central Coast region.
Research studies
Recent research studies which have expanded the evidence base on the composition and sources of particle pollution in the region have included the Lower Hunter Particle Characterisation Study and the Lower Hunter Dust Deposition Study (completed in 2016) and the Coal Particle Study at Stockton (published in 2017).
