An army of 176 volunteer "odor police" are pounding the streets of the French Mediterranean port of Marseille as part of a crackdown on smell pollution, the daily Le Figaro reported on Saturday.
Deployed by air analysis firm Airmaraix, the volunteer "noses" are required to record what they smell on a daily basis, ranging from "pleasant" through "irritating" to "nauseating."
Over the past three months, the team has identified whiffs of rotten egg and burnt plastic on the outskirts of the city and a rancid mixture of refuse, petrol fumes, drains, fish, tobacco, soap and marijuana in the center. "We have to determine how many people are bothered by these odors, in which places, and what the origins of these olfactory nuisances are," said Gregoire Auge, a scientist at odor analysis firm EOG, also involved in the scheme.
However Airmaraix, which is checking the results with weather patterns on a computer to try to establish a "smell index", is finding judging smells and their intensity to be a highly subjective science.
The volunteers are reported to be keen that their work should not be in vain, and should lead to concrete measures to curb smell pollution.
"Establishing that it stinks is all very well but putting remedies in place would be even better," one was quoted as saying.
