Delhi to get its own emissions inventory at a 500m x 500m spatial resolution
Delhi Government’s Real time source apportionment and pollution forecasting study by IIT Kanpur on track
IIT Kanpur team visits Delhi to identify supersite for real time source apportionment study
We are glad that IIT Kanpur team is making good progress on their commitment of setting up real time source apportionment study: Gopal Rai
NEW DELHI:
Kejriwal Government moves one step closer to operationalization of the real time source apportionment and pollution forecasting system. Delhi Pollution Control Committee and Environment department of Delhi Government today held the 2nd review meeting on a project titled “Real time source apportionment study and pollution forecasting” with the team from IIT Kanpur and other partner organizations. The project was approved by the Delhi Cabinet and the MoU was signed in October last year. A team of IIT-Kanpur, IIT-Delhi, The Energy & Resources Institute (TERI), and IISER Mohali will execute the study in the national capital. Delhi Government’s Delhi Pollution Control Committee has been authorized to act as the nodal agency for executing the study with IIT Kanpur.
Environment Minister Gopal Rai said, “We are extremely glad that the IIT Kanpur study is progressing well on time despite the occasional disruptions caused by Covid-19. I congratulate the team at IIT Kanpur and DPCC for setting up good programme management mechanisms to ensure timely progress. We look forward to receiving the results of the study in the next few months and Delhi becoming the first city to have a real time source apportionment of air pollution”.
The “Real-time Source apportionment” project will help identify the factors responsible for the spike in air pollution at any spot in Delhi. It will help understand the real-time impact of various pollution sources like vehicles, dust, biomass burning, stubble burning, and emissions from industries. Based on the results obtained, the Delhi government will be able to take the necessary actions to curb the sources of pollution. This will go a long way in identifying the various factors contributing to Delhi’s pollution and addressing those factors.
“The availability of pollution forecasting on an hourly basis for the next 7 days will be extremely crucial for the government to take data-backed policy decisions around school closures, construction site ban, vehicular restrictions, among others. Currently due to the absence of a reliable forecasting system, we are bound to make decisions based on previous years’ experience rather than the future forecast”, said Reena Gupta, Advisor to Environment Minister.
Key highlights presented by IIT Kanpur team today include successful contracting with IIT Delhi, TERI and other partners for their respective scope of work, closure of tender process for purchase of India based equipment like real time ambient air analyzer and online particulate matter and ion analysis system, timely progress of global tender for purchase of advanced equipment, and progress on the development of the air pollution forecasting system to provide hourly, daily and weekly data on air pollution.
The IIT Kanpur team also visited a few locations in Delhi to identify a suitable location for set-up of a supersite which is very critical for the study. Based on these options, the most suitable location will be made available by Delhi Government to them. TERI has also started the groundwork for creation of a 2022 emissions inventory which will be useful for pollution forecasting. This emissions inventory will be extremely advanced and have a fine spatial resolution of 500m x 500m (compared to the 2km x 2km resolution used by IITM for the SAFAR pollution forecasting).