Curbing air pollution in India needs efforts across South Asia

(MainsGS3:Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.)

Context:

• While existing measures by the government can reduce particulate matter, significant reduction is possible only if the territories spanning the airsheds implement coordinated policies, says the report, Striving for Clean Air: Air Pollution and Public Health in South Asia, released by the World Bank.

Modelling approach:

• Using a modelling approach over South Asia as a whole, the report lays out multiple scenarios and the costs involved in reducing the average South Asian’s exposure to particulate matter. 
• Currently over 60% of South Asians are exposed to an average 35 µg/m3 of PM2.5 annually. 
• In some parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain (IGP) it spiked to as much as 100 µg/m3 – nearly 20 times the upper limit of 5 µg/m3 recommended by the World Health Organisation, says the World Bank report.

Airsheds in South Asia:

• An airshed is a region in which the atmosphere shares common features with respect to the dispersion of pollutants or in other words, a region sharing a common flow of air.
• The six major airsheds in South Asia where air quality in one affected the other were: (1) West/Central IGP that included Punjab (Pakistan), Punjab (India), Haryana, part of Rajasthan, Chandigarh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh. 2) Central/Eastern IGP: Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bangladesh; (3) Middle India: Odisha/Chhattisgarh; (4) Middle India: Eastern Gujarat/Western Maharashtra; (5) Northern/Central Indus River Plain: Pakistan, part of Afghanistan; and (6) Southern Indus Plain and further west: South Pakistan, Western Afghanistan extending into Eastern Iran.
• When the wind direction was predominantly northwest to southeast, 30% of the air pollution in Indian Punjab came from the Punjab Province in Pakistan and, on average, 30% of the air pollution in the largest cities of Bangladesh (Dhaka, Chittagong, and Khulna) originated in India.

Adopt feasible measures:

• According to the report, if Delhi National Capital Territory were to fully implement all air pollution control measures by 2030 while other parts of South Asia continued to follow current policies, it wouldn’t keep pollution exposure below 35 µg/m3. 
• However if other parts of South Asia also adopted all feasible measures it would bring pollution below that number. 
• This is also the case with many other cities in South Asia, especially those in the IGP. 
• Accounting for the interdependence in air quality within airsheds in South Asia is necessary when weighing alternative pathways for pollution control.
• The most cost-effective effort to curb air pollution is to calls for full coordination between airsheds, would cut the average exposure of PM 2.5 in South Asia to 30 µg/m³ at a cost of $278 million (₹2,400 crore) per µg/mᶾ of reduced exposure, and save more than 7,50,000 lives annually.

Conclusion:

• Persistently hazardous levels of air pollution have caused a major public health crisis in South Asia that demands urgent action.
• Thus, curbing air pollution requires not only tackling its specific sources, but also close coordination across local and national jurisdictional boundaries.