Lockdown clears up India's air

NEW DELHI: While the country is caught in a lockdown and faces a grim battle with COVID 19, the Central Pollution Control Board has assessed that the ‘Janta Curfew’ on March 22 and the lockdown since March 24 has led to a near dramatic improvement in the air quality across large parts of India especially Delhi-NCR and the Indo-gangetic plain. As on March 29, 2020, a total of 91 cities were under ‘Good’ & ‘Satisfactory’ category, with 31 cities with ‘Good’ AQI values. As on March 29, 2020 no city is under ‘Poor’ AQI category. Substantial improvement in air quality of Delhi NCR is noted during the lockdown period- PM10 and PM2.5 levels were reduced by about 35 to 40% in Delhi as the major contributing sources to PM & NOx emissions (prominent pollutants in Delhi NCR) have been restricted. The improvement in air quality of 85 cities was noted as most of the vehicles remained off road and non-essential industrial units closed during Janta Curfew and national wide lockdown. Most of the million plus population cities, which have high population density and substantial share of emissions from transport sector, showed improvement in air quality levels Indo gangetic cities showed significant improvement in AQI values with levels moving from higher to lower end of category and 17 cities moving in ‘Satisfactory’ category and 07 cities in ‘Good’ category. Higher AQI value was seen in Kanpur with PM2.5 as prominent pollutant, likely emanating from local combustion sources. The positive impact on air quality was also not observed significantly in industrial cities- high AQI value was noted in Vapi, Ratlam (SO2 as prominent pollutant), Satna, Singrauli and Chandrapur seemingly due emissions from industrial areas. However, Lucknow, Muzaffarpur, Kalyan, Guwahati & Singrauli were under ‘Poor’ category during March 25-28, 2020. High emission levels in Lucknow & Guwahati were noted for PM2.5, which can be attributed to local combustion related activities.