India tops China in air pollution level increase

There's just one area in which India has outrun China - air pollution. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Nov 30, 2012, 03:20:03 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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There's just one area in which India has outrun China - air pollution.

The rise in air pollution levels in Indian megacities between 2002 and 2010 has been much more than Chinese urban centres. It was also the highest among 189 cities analysed by the Tel Aviv University, using NASA's high-tech aerosol monitoring satellites.

The study, using data from three different satellites, showed that particulate matter - caused by dust and vehicular emissions - increased by more than 10% in most Indian cities whereas the maximum increase of 5 to 10% was witnessed only in northern Chinese cities.

"The increasing aerosol trends over the largest cities in the Indian subcontinent, West Asia, and North China can be clearly seen. By contrast, megacities in Europe, the northeast of US, and South-East Asia show mainly declining trends," said the study, released by the American Journal of Climate Change this week.

Bangalore, the 'Indian Silicon Valley', earned the dubious distinction of witnessing the second-highest increase (34%) in air pollution levels among 189 cities, after Portland in the US.

Other Indian cities that recorded a high increase in air pollution levels were Pune at 27%, Nagpur at 22%, Mumbai at 18%, Bhilai at 17.7%, Surat at 12.5% and Ahmedabad at 12%.

However, the usual culprits - Delhi and Kanpur - recorded just 4.2% and 6.5% increase in particulate matter.

The data captured by satellites hundreds of metres above the ground show a different picture than information gathered through ground monitoring.

Also, high atmospheric aerosol concentration in space modifies cloud properties, leading to less rainfall, and dimming of solar radiation in cities. "Data show that solar radiation over big cities with high population concentration has reduced, causing its own health problems," the study said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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