Noida air quality on the mend, but still toxic

Noida: Even as the air quality in Noida kept fluctuating between ‘poor’ and severe’ levels over the last one week, two fast food vendors were arrested Friday for

Noida: Even as the air quality in Noida kept fluctuating between ‘poor’ and severe’ levels over the last one week, two fast food vendors were arrested Friday for setting fire to garbage on November 16 in Sector 94, near Amity University.

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According to officials, vendors Manish and Subhash, who run a food van near the university, burnt garbage and the fire soon spread to the fields nearby that were covered with dry and long halfa (grass). Officials said the fire soon spread over an area of nearly 2,000 square feet.

“The accused have been arrested Friday, presented before the magistrate and sent to jail. A case has been registered under the Environment Protection Act and Section 278/268 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for making the air toxic,” an official from the district administration said.

On Friday, Noida’s air quality saw a marginal improvement with the air quality index (AQI), as recorded by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), moving out of the ‘severe’ category ( 400-500) to settle in the upper ranges of ‘very poor’ (350-400).

The AQI on Friday, on a scale of 0 to 500, was 380 or ‘very poor’ against 402 or ‘severe’ a day earlier. On Friday, the wind speed increased slightly to 8-10kmph towards afternoon which helped improve the air quality.

According to the pollution monitoring agencies, the air quality will improve further on Saturday as wind speeds are set to increase.

The air quality, though ‘very poor’ is still toxic with the major pollutant PM2.5 level (particles with diameter less than 2.5 microns) recorded at 253.28 microgrammes per cubic metre Friday, according to CPCB. This is three times the national safe limit of 60μg/m3 and over nine times the International limit of 25μg/m3.

“The wind direction Friday varied from south west to north west. So, the intrusion of external emissions from stubble burning from Punjab and Haryana was lesser on Friday, so that helped a little in improving the air quality. The wind speed will pick up more on Saturday and may reach around 15kmph. So this will help improve the air quality,” Mahesh Palawat, director private weather forecasting agency, Skymet, said.

According to System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (Safar), further improvement of air quality — to the ‘poor’ category — is expected by November 24 as higher wind speeds are likely to flush out accumulated pollutants from the region.

Meanwhile, the cases of open burning continued despite a blanket ban on the practice and a number of directions from the authority. Residents reported incidents of open burning near Gaur Chowk after a few piles of garbage were set afire by unknown people. According to residents, garbage is often dumped on roadsides or on green belts from where it’s not collected for days and people get rid of it by setting it on fire.

“The incidents cannot stop because there is a lack of awareness among people and also because garbage collection is not up to the mark. Authorities often work on paper but the ground reality is different. There are only a few roads where water is sprinkled and from where garbage is collected. There is a dire need to spread awareness against open burning,” Vikrant Tongad, a Greater Noida resident and environmentalist, said.