Poor air quality is dangerous for health, the environment and many industrial activities; recently, a correlation has been hypothesized with the pace of coronavirus outbreak in some areas. We advocate the use of integrated assessment modelling (Iam) as a tool of decision support system for regulators that are in charge of air quality control. Since pollutants in the atmosphere depend on multiple sources of emission and some of them have non-linear reactions when in contact with other substances, traditional models of response for air quality pollution do not perform well. Iams allow for multiobjective optimization, also taking into account the costs of emission reduction, thus introducing the notion of cost-effectiveness in air quality control.