Super lab to analyse pollution data likely in Delhi’s Mandir Marg

20 unmanned monitoring stations will also be set up in the city to create a grid that will allow government monitor in real-time sources of pollution at the local level

A ‘super laboratory’ to monitor in real time data from various pollution sources across the city may come up at Mandir Marg in central Delhi, according to officials aware of the matter.

A cyclist out on the road amid foggy weather conditions, at Mayur Vihar, on January 13, 2022. (Amal KS/)

They added that 20 unmanned monitoring stations will also be set up in the city to create a grid that will allow government monitor in real-time sources of pollution at the local level.

Last October, the Delhi government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with IIT-Kanpur, IIT Delhi, The Energy & Resources Institute (TERI) and IISER, Mohali to map Delhi’s sources of pollution in real-time, so that specific actions can be taken immediately. The Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) will be the nodal agency for the project, and will execute the project in coordination with IIT-Kanpur.

A senior DPCC official who asked not to be named said the project was progressing according to the deadlines set earlier, and added that location of the super lab may be finalised in the “coming weeks”.

“The lab will have all the equipment required to map sources of pollution in real time ,and it will act as an advance air quality monitoring station. An area which provides representative air pollution data will be chosen as the location to set up the laboratory,” the official said.

Mukesh Sharma from IIT Kanpur, who is working on the project, said the lab could be set up by July, and real-time data is expected to come August onwards. “Mandir Marg records multiple sources of pollution, and by mapping an area within 2-3 kilometre radius we can ascertain concentration of different pollutants from various sources. We aim to gather data in summer and monsoon too besides winter when the pollution is high,” he said.

Sharma said the unmanned automatic stations will provide an insight into the composition of air, including heavy metals. “The automatic stations will not provide real-time data, but they will give us an idea on the composition of heavy metals in the air, the PM 2.5 to PM 10 ratio and much more, allowing us to gauge pollution levels at hot spots,” Sharma added.

Delhi environment minister Gopal Rai held a review meeting of the project last month, and said that it was progressing “as desired”. “We are extremely glad that the IIT Kanpur study is progressing well on time, despite the occasional disruptions caused by Covid-19. I congratulate the team at IIT Kanpur and DPCC for setting up good programme management mechanisms to ensure timely progress. We look forward to receiving the results of the study in the next few months and Delhi becoming the first city to have a real time source apportionment of air pollution,” Rai had said after the meeting.

Officials said equipments such as a real-time ambient air analyzer and the online particulate matter & ion analysis system had already been ordered for the super lab. Meanwhile, TERI is laying groundwork for the creation of an emissions inventory for the year 2022, which will quantify the load of pollution from different sources. This emissions inventory is expected to be extremely advanced and will have fine spatial resolution of 500m x 500m as compared to the 2km x 2km resolution currently being used by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) for forecasts carried out by Safar.