Major cities around the world to ban diesel cars by 2025

Paris, Mexico City, Madrid and Athens have agreed to ban the circulation of diesel cars in the four capital cities by 2025, reports the BBC.

The four mayors from the capital cities of Spain, Mexico, Greece and France, which all suffer from high levels of air pollution, have agreed to leave diesel cars outside of the cities by 2025 at the C40 Mayors Summit 2016, taking place this week in Mexico City.

In an effort to improve air quality and reduce the characteristic grey cloud of 'smog' that rests over each of those cities during dry periods, the four mayors will implement a ban on diesel and promote alternative fuels, as well as cycling.

Diesel vehicles increase air pollution by producing particular matter and nitrogen oxides; while the former contributes to cardiovascular illness, the latter exacerbates breathing problems and causes new ones, according to the World Health Organization.

Mayors from 86 cities have gathered at the C40 Mayors Summit 2016 to draw a plan for the reduction of gas emissions and contamination, in an attempt to comply with the 2015 Paris Agreement to not exceed a 1.5 degree Celsius increase in global temperature. The mayors have agreed a four-year plan to half carbon emissions with a budget of $375 billion.