Air quality picks up due to favourable weather conditions

Pollution levels in the city dipped significantly on Tuesday, recording an air quality index (AQI) of 270, in the ’poor’ zone, on the Central Pollution Control Board’s

Pollution levels in the city dipped significantly on Tuesday, recording an air quality index (AQI) of 270, in the ’poor’ zone, on the Central Pollution Control Board’s (CPCB) daily bulletin. This is a sharp improvement from Monday’s AQI reading of 304, which indicated ‘very poor’ air quality.

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Experts and officials attributed the improvement to strong northwesterly winds, and a reduction in farm fires toward the end of stubble burning season. They also cautioned, however, that any relief from the improvement would be short-lived, with colder temperatures approaching in the next two weeks.

Experts also said that an increase in nighttime minimum temperature, from 10.2 degrees Celsius on Monday to just under 12 degrees Celsius on Tuesday, had also facilitated an improvement in air quality.

“This, coupled with strong northwesterly winds, and a reduction in farm fires toward the end of stubble burning, allowed a fair bit of pollutants to be meteorologically dispersed on Tuesday, resulting in ‘poor’ air for the first time in over a week,” said Sachin Panwar, a city-based independent air quality scientist.

However, experts also said that the improvement is only temporary, with the India Meteorological Department predicting cold-wave conditions in isolated pockets of north India on the morning of November 4.

As per a forecast by the CPCB’s central control room for air quality monitoring, Gurugram is likely to experience ‘very poor’ air once again on Wednesday, with a predicted AQI reading of 360. The air quality is expected to turn ‘severe’ by November 6, with a predicted AQI of 420. As per the early air quality warning system for Delhi-NCR, “Air quality is likely to remain in lower end of ‘very poor’ category on 04.11.2020 and higher end of ‘very poor’ category on 05.11.2020.”