Pollution levels in Pune have risen dramatically in seven years: report
The air quality of Pune that is mainly regulated by particulate pollutants (PM2
The air quality of Pune that is mainly regulated by particulate pollutants (PM2.5 and PM10) have both seen a considerable rise in the past seven years, according to a joint report by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) under the Ministry of Earth Sciences along with Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) and the expert advice of Sarojkumar Sahu of Utkal University.
According to the study, the particulate matter (PM) 2.5 has seen an increase of 70 per cent while PM10 has seen an increase of 61 per cent from 2012-13 to 2019-20 in Pune.
One of the major contributing factors to this rise in pollution is the enormous growth of vehicles during the past seven years, revealed the report called ‘High Resolution Emission Inventory (400 Meters) for 2019-20’ released on Friday.
The Geographical Information System (GIS)-based statistical emission model is developed by scientists of IITM and is used to develop fine resolution of 400m gridded products.
The final product yielded mapping of pollution sources in each 400m x 400m grid of Pune for eight major pollutants namely, PM2.5, PM10, Nitrogen Oxide (NOx), Carbon Monoxide (CO), Sulphur Dioxide (SO2), BC, HC. The report was released by Nitin Karmalkar, vice-chancellor of SPPU, in presence of director, IITM, Ravi Nanjundiah, lead author Gufran Beig, founder project director, Safar, and Dr BS Murthy of IITM and Prof Suresh Gosavi, head, Environment Science department, SPPU.
The survey was conducted for six months for a long emission inventory campaign involving more than 200 students from IITM, SPPU and Utkal University from 2019-20 in Pune Metropolitan regions including Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad. The data was compared with that of 2012-2013 and the report was published.
As per the report, the transportation sector was found to be the major contributor in PM2.5 emissions as compared to the rest of the sources.
Gufran Beig, lead author and director of System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) said that though industrial production has increased over the years, emissions show a minimal rise as compared to other sectors.
“This might be due to the improved fuel quality used in units, efficient technological innovations and stringent enforcement of standards. Similarly, a significant increase is observed in the emissions of Organic Carbon (81.3%), NOx (72.8%), and Volatile organic compound (VOCs) (69.8%). Sulphur dioxide emissions show a 30.2% increase, lowest amongst the eight pollutants considered in this work,” said Beig.
He added that the growth in emission was more in Pune than it was in Delhi.
“The growth of pollution is too high for Pune city and if not checked on time, pollution in Pune city may increase at a high rate,” said Beig.
Gosavi said that areas with more traffic congestion were seen to report higher levels of pollution.
“Areas like Swargate, Nal Stop were reporting higher pollution than others. The major pollution is due to traffic,” said Gosavi.
Box
Header: Rise in pollution
Info: Percentage change in PM10 and PM2.5 and the emissions during the past seven years from 2012-13 to 2019-20
=Sectors===PM10== PM2.5
=Transport=== ↑ 87.9%=== ↑ 91.0%
=Industrial ===↑ 33.8%== ↑ 32.9%
=Residential* ↑ 107====.7% ↑ 57.9%
=WBR Dust== ↑ 49.5%=== ↑ 38.1%
=Other# ==NA$== NA$
==Total== ↑ 61.3%== ↑ 70.0%
*Residential sector - cooking, slums, trash burning, cow dung, street vendors, household, wood burning
#Other Sectors - MSW Plants, MSW Open Burning, Crematory, Aviation, Incense Stick, Brick Clams
WBR Dust- Wind Blown Re-suspended dust
Source: Report ‘High Resolution Emission Inventory (400 Meters) for 2019-20’