Policy, mitigation must be long-term focus: Experts weigh in on Delhi’s pollution fight

What should Delhi focus on now: Delhi still needs to reduce levels by between 55% to 59% to meet national standards for PM 2.5. Scale and speed of action will have to be hugely disruptive.

We need a strategy to address volume of traffic, and a massive mobility transition, a clean mass transport mode, and the infrastructure that is needed for it, integrated public transport system supported by walking, cycling infrastructure, and restraint measures (congestion pricing, parking policy, low emissions zones in the city) so we don’t use cars as much.

Lessons from the hard lockdown of the pandemic need to be remembered — regional influence on pollution could be minimised then because activity in the entire region was controlled. Action will have to be scaled up across the region.

Gufran Beig, Founder project director, SAFAR, and chair professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies

What has worked so far: Annual emission data indicates that emissions have increased not declined. Despite that, air quality has shown improvement in recent times, because of short-term measures like GRAP that reduce the magnitude of the pollution peak.

What should Delhi focus on now: Long-term solutions for decline in emissions — faster switch to EVs from fossil fuel-based vehicles, ensuring access to cleaner cooking fuel in areas around Delhi as well. Delhi is a land-locked city, and mitigation measures need to be taken across the entire airshed, not just in Delhi.

Sachchida Nand Tripathi, Professor at IIT-Kanpur and Steering Committee member, National Clean Air Programme

What has worked so far: Air quality monitoring in Delhi, with around 40 government monitors, has helped authorities check what’s happening, and over the years they have looked at where the hotspots are.

We also have a more conscious citizenry now and allied agencies have brought measures like replacing dirty fuel in industries at least to a certain extent. That has brought some decline in annual average PM 2.5 over the last few years. There were a couple of years when Covid was there, so we don’t have sufficient long-term series, but there is some indication that PM 2.5 is declining.

What should Delhi focus on now: What has been done is very basic. This needs to be rapidly built up. We need to ramp up air quality monitoring in NCR, and we need to have a more responsive regulatory system. This means we need to improve capacity — people who understand this kind of data should be able to rapidly analyse and make use of it. This needs to be backed up with large-scale policy decisions like ensuring access to LPG across NCR.

 Dipankar Saha,  Former head, CPCB Air Laboratory

What has worked so far: Steps taken so far aim for emission control at the ground level, but how much is actually implemented is not known to us.

What should Delhi focus on now: Mitigation is a continuous process and it must be remembered that total emissions of any city, district or state remain the same through the year… except in some cases like stubble burning in winter, when the wind flow is calm, and in calm conditions, pollutants accumulate. The public plays a major role in emission control at the domestic level. So, it should eventually be everybody’s responsibility, not just of the government machinery.

Shibani Ghosh, Environmental Lawyer

There is no alternative to moving to an airshed-level governance system. For this, the NCR is not enough, we need a broader approach to the Indo-Gangetic Plain. We have to involve Punjab and Haryana and states that are downwind. It’s not possible for Delhi to act on its own on some things. Solutions to its pollution problem cannot come from the state government alone. Unless the CAQM and the MoEFCC start putting in place ways in which all states across this region start working together, there are only so many gains to be had.