On first day of Grap, air in Noida, Ghaziabad and Greater Noida plunge to ‘very poor’

The environmental pollution (prevention and control) authority’s (Epca’s) graded response action plan (Grap) kicked in on Thursday.

The environmental pollution (prevention and control) authority’s (Epca’s) graded response action plan (Grap) kicked in on Thursday.

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Under this plan, the Epca, which is a Supreme Court appointed monitoring committee, banned the use of diesel generator sets from October 15. The plan, which is graded according to the quality of air, requires local agencies to take up measures at their level.

On the day, Ghaziabad Noida and Greater Noida recorded “very poor” air. According to Grap, agencies are required to discourage the use of vehicles by increasing parking charges, stop use of coal/firewood, residents’ welfare associations (RWAs) are to provide electric heaters to their security staff.

At very poor levels, fine particulate matter (smaller than 10 microns) and ultra fine particulate matter (smaller than 2.5 microns) would be four times the safe limit.

As per the central pollution control board (CPCB) daily bulletin, the AQI stood at 357 for Greater Noida, 322 for Ghaziabad and 321 for Noida. It is for the first time this season that the three cities together have witnessed “very poor” air. Last year same day, the values were 302 for Greater Noida, 308 Ghaziabad and 297 for Noida.

An AQI between zero and 50 is considered “good”, 51 and 100 “satisfactory”, 101 and 200 “moderate”, 201 and 300 “poor”, 301 and 400 “very poor”, and 401 and 500 “severe.”

“The current rise in pollution levels has been due to slow wind speed, which is almost nil during the night and hardly 8-10 kmph during the day. So, this scenario is leading to low dispersal of pollutants,” said Kuldeep Srivastava, head of Indian Meteorological Department’s Regional Weather Forecasting Centre, New Delhi.

To flush out pollutants, the wind speed should be at least 18kmph in the national capital region (NCR).

“Pollutants due to stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana, and local pollutants are getting trapped in the region due to slow wind speed and hence resulting in rise in pollution levels,” he said.

On Thursday, most of the NCR region including Delhi, Gurugram, Faridabad, Bulandshahr, Meerut and Baghpat also stood under the ‘very poor’ category.

In Ghaziabad, barring Indirapuram online monitoring station whose data could not be computed for technical reasons, the monitoring stations at Loni and Vasundhara read “very poor”, while the Sanjay Nagar station was just a shade lower at “poor”.

Likewise, the two monitoring stations at Knowledge Park III and Knowledge Park V recorded AQI levels at “very poor” and “severe” category, respectively.

Likewise, all the three of four monitoring stations at sector-62, sector-1 and sector-116 recorded AQI at 316, 334 and 312, respectively, under ‘very poor’ category at 4pm on Thursday. The AQI levels for sector-125 monitoring station could not be computed due to technical issues.

Environmentalists said that the measures to abate pollution should also include study of meteorological conditions.

“Over past 20 to 25 years, there has been lot of development of infrastructure and housing projects in NCR region and the structure also cause change in wind pattern and speed. So, there has to be a comprehensive study of such factors while chalking out policies. Further, the local pollutants always play major role in raising pollution levels and must be tackled through rigorous awareness and enforcement,” said Akash Vashishtha, Ghaziabad-based environmentalist. “Stubble burning isn’t something new has been in practice since decades. But the top agencies should try to find other contributing factors as well.”

According to official statistics of the Consortium for Research on Agroecosystem Monitoring and Modelling from Space (CREAMS) Laboratory – a Division of Agricultural Physics, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi, -- there have been 4,015 stubble burning incidents in Punjab, Haryana and UP from October 1 to October 14.

The figure is highest in three years when the numbers stood at 2119 in 2019 and 2154 in 2018 for the same period for the three states.

The officials of UPPCB said that the effect on AQI is due to meteorological conditions.

“On our part we are taking up every measure to control pollution besides taking up daily surveillance in different areas and also sensitizing people. The current situation is more due to meteorological conditions and there is no surge in local conditions,” said Praveen Kumar, regional officer of UPPCB, Noida.

The officials also added that the ‘severe’ category AQI at Knowledge Park V station was due to localised condition of digging work going on.

“The slowness in wind speed and lesser dispersal of pollutants has caused rise in air pollution. At local level, different agencies have taken up all steps with respect to monitoring of construction sites, road washing, dust control measures and checks on industrial emission in order to reduce pollution levels,” said Utsav Sharma, regional officer of UPPCB, Noida and Ghaziabad.