Cracker ban goes up in smoke as air worsens to ‘severe’ zone

Residents showed scant regard for the firecracker ban on Diwali, with extensive cracker bursting across the city since Saturday evening plunging the air quality

Residents showed scant regard for the firecracker ban on Diwali, with extensive cracker bursting across the city since Saturday evening plunging the air quality to the ‘severe’ category, once again, on Sunday.

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Gurugram’s daily air quality index (AQI) reading for the day, as per the Central Pollution Control Board’s daily bulletin, was at 425 — up from a ‘very poor’ AQI of 358 on Diwali day. Several citizens also took to social media to voice their criticism against the use of firecrackers, which could be seen and heard until well after midnight on Saturday.

All four official air quality monitors in Gurugram recorded a sharp increase in the concentration of particulate matter pollutants between 8pm on November 14 and 12am on November 15.

At Vikas Sadan in Sector 11, the level of finer particulate matter with diameter of 2.5 microns or less (PM2.5) rose from 340 micrograms per cubic metre (ug/m3) at 6pm to over 500ug/m3 at midnight, and remained well above 400ug/m3 until 6am. In Sector 51, the level of PM2.5 rose from 300ug/m3 at 6pm to over 500ug/3 at midnight, while the level of PM10 rose from 140ug/m3 to 461ug/m3 at 10pm.

Similar spurts in particulate matter were seen at two other air quality monitoring stations in the vicinity of Gwal Pahari, along the Gurgaon-Faridabad road. Hazardous levels of PM pollutants — exceeding concentrations of 400ug/m3 — persisted at all four monitoring locations until the wee hours of Sunday morning, and receded into the 330ug/m3 to 390ug/m3 range by afternoon, official data shows.

Although the bursting of crackers remained muted throughout the day, it picked up pace between 6pm and 11pm, which majorly contributed to pollution on Diwali evening. A large number of residents also called authorities to register a complaint in this matter, but overall the enforcement of the ban on crackers was lax, alleged residents.

Publicly available data from these monitoring stations also reveals spikes in the levels of chemical pollutants like sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and carbon monoxide (CO) on Diwali night. For instance, in Sector 51, the concentration of CO rose from 60ug/m3 at 6pm to 133ug/m3 at 10pm. At Vikas Sadan, the concentration of SO2 rose from 16ug/m3 at 6pm to 106ug/m3 at 10pm.

Officials in the Haryana State Pollution Control Board, as well as experts, attributed this spurt in pollution directly to firecracker emissions. With stricter adherence to the NGT’s ban, they added, air quality may have remained ‘very poor’ on Sunday, below the 400 AQI mark.

However, officials also claimed that the city saw decreased firecracker emissions, in comparison to 2019, partly due to reduced use and partly due to favourable meteorological conditions.

As per data provided by the HSPCB’s regional office in Gurugram, a dip in the level of PM2.5 was observed at its monitoring station in Vikas Sadan, as compared to 2019. “Last year on Diwali night, PM2.5 peaked to over 900ug/m3. This year, the maximum concentration was 633ug/m3. Similar variance from last year is also seen in the quantity of SO2 and NO2 at this same location. We can say it is because of less firecracker use this year. Non-availability in the market has worked to a degree,” said Kuldeep Singh, the HSPCB’s regional officer, Gurugram.

Experts, meanwhile, said that while firecracker intensity has been lower this year, the overall pollution level is worse than last year. CPCB data from last year shows that Gurugram’s AQI a day after Diwali, on October 28, 2019, stood at ‘very poor’, with an AQI of 372 (as against 425 this year).

“Last year, Diwali happened in late October, when the weather was warmer. There was also no stringent cracker ban as we have seen this year. So yes, we anticipate that the intensity of firecracker emissions has been less, but we are already at a point in the pollution cycle when the AQI is quite high, which is why it is not really a ‘cleaner’ Diwali,” said Sachin Panwar, a city-based independent air quality scientist.

Panwar, who has been tracking pollution levels in the city since early on Friday, also explained, “Gurugram saw extremely high wind speeds which touched 12kmph in some parts of the city on Diwali night, so pollutants from firecrackers were not allowed to accumulate. These winds were followed by light rain on Sunday afternoon, which will further alleviate the situation.”

The early air quality warning system for Delhi-NCR stated, “The strong easterly winds are highly favourable of removal of pollutants on 15.11.2020. The air quality is likely to remain in lower end of very poor to poor category on 16.11.2020. The air quality is likely to remain in poor category on 17.11.2020.”