2 yrs on, Gzb awaits report on pollutants

Ghaziabad: In 2019, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) commissioned IIT-Delhi to carry out a study to find out what exactly are the sources of pollution in Ghaziabad’s air. The regional pollution control board is expecting the report before this winter. Officials, however, said that they are finding it hard to chalk out a strategy to deal with the problem in the absence of the pollution source appropriation data.
Utsav Sharma, regional officer of the UP Pollution Control Board, said, “With the air pollution level reaching an alarming proportion in Ghaziabad, especially during every winter, it is the need of the hour to have a study highlighting the major sources of pollution to draw up a roadmap to deal with the problem. We hope to get the IIT-Delhi report before the onset of winter that will help us identify the major pollution contributors.”
Ghaziabad has so far been framing guidelines on pollution control measures on the basis of 2018 report on pollution source appropriation in Delhi-NCR, which was done by TERI. “The study was last conducted three years ago, according to which vehicular pollution in winter contributes to 30% of PM2 .5 and 18% of PM 10. In Ghaziabad, this cannot be entirely true as it has been traditionally an industrial city. So, the role of industries needs to be ascertained too,” Sharma said.
“We have been conducting our own surveys to find out the pollution hotspots in the district but since it lacks a scientific approach, the pollution source appropriation study will come in handy to devise a pollution control strategy for the city,” he added.