© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
Tags:
Journalism of Courage
Between October 1 and 30, 66 instances of poor air quality index (AQI) were recorded in 16 pockets across Mumbai. Sion had bad air for 10 days, followed by nine days each in Andheri and Mazagaon. On some days, the city’s overall AQI readings were worse than Delhi’s.
Last winter, in the 92 days from November 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, the AQI in Mumbai was poor or worse on 66 days.
Mumbai is surrounded by the sea on three sides. Coastal cities see strong winds, which sweep away suspended pollutants in the air. Despite this geographical advantage, a combination of natural and man-made factors are driving down the city’s AQI.
After the southwest monsoon retreated on October 10, Mumbai has been experiencing relatively calm air, which has contributed to the delayed wind reversal.
Beig, however, said he believes the current problem is temporary. “So many construction works have been taken up in a short span of time, without adequate planning for dust mitigation measures. The AQI will get better once the projects are completed,” he said.
“When you are trying to evaluate the air, you need to first identify the sources that contribute to the factors that determine the AQI. For example, if garbage burning is taking place somewhere in the eastern suburbs, it may impact only those who live close by,” Tripathi said.
All 21 monitoring stations in Mumbai use Continuous Ambient Air Quality Monitoring Systems (CAAQMS), which compute the air quality by trapping dust particles in
the inlet. Each station costs between Rs 1.3 crore and Rs 1.5 crore.
Authorities should also consider setting up sensor-based AQI monitoring units that give hyperlocal data, Tripathi said. Each of these units costs around Rs 50,000.
“This will not only give us the advantage of denser monitoring but will also empower the authorities to take immediate preemptive action, because you can take action only when you have adequate information.
“For example, if it is found that construction is taking place in a certain pocket without following norms, the authorities can identify the location and immediately penalise the violators,” Tripathi said.
“The wind does not obey jurisdictions but the bureaucracy has to, so the municipal commissioner of Mumbai would not be able to take action against garbage burning in Thane or Navi Mumbai, even if the pollution from the site affects Mumbai’s AQI,” Tripathi said.
“To address this issue, one needs to set up an independent commission for management of AQI. This commission should empower members to take action against any violator irrespective of geographical borders. This system has done fairly well in Delhi; the authorities have taken action in Haryana, UP, and Rajasthan for activities that would affect the city’s air.”
“The administration needs to rope in an adequate number of engineers, scientists, health experts, and legal advisers. If you look at Delhi or London, so many solutions have been chalked out based on long term research carried out by scientists and experts. In Mumbai, academic institutions are hardly involved and I believe that including them in the search for solutions will bring better results,” Tripathi said.
“There are several bottlenecks in Mumbai that see huge traffic congestion. An emissions study needs to be done for these junctions and, based on the findings, an emissions-based policy needs to be chalked out and implemented immediately on the ground,” Beig said.
“One can see how Delhi augmented the number of stations to get a vast network of data. Research institutions too, have been roped in to carry out regular studies,” he said.
London, Tripathi said, has as many as 110 monitoring stations, apart from sensor-based monitors. Considering the geography of Mumbai, it too, should have a similar number of monitoring stations, he said.
Over the past few years, 530 sensor-based AQI monitoring stations have been set up in 38 districts in Bihar, and 840 such sensors are being set up across 75 districts in Uttar Pradesh, he said.
“Earlier there used to be only 35 monitors in all of Bihar which allowed us to get a data point only every 5,000 sq km. Today, we have a sensor for every 300 sq km, and this is helping us get micro air shades of the state,” Tripathi added.
Dr Gufran Beig is Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee Chair Professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, and founder director of India’s System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR).
Dr Sachchida Nand Tripathi is Professor at IIT-Kanpur and Member of the Steering and Monitoring Committee of the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP). Dr Beig and Dr Tripathi, both winners of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize, are India’s foremost air pollution experts.
