Delhi pollution

NEW DELHI: The city saw considerable improvement in air quality on Friday, with overnight winds improving the fog situation and ventilating pollutants out. With the air quality index entering the poor category, GRAP stage-III was revoked, allowing construction activities and BS-IV diesel and BS-III petrol vehicles in NCR-Delhi.

AQI, however, is likely to turn very poor from Sunday.The city recorded shallow fog, with visibility at Palam at 800 metres and 1,000m at Safdarjung. Due to poor weather conditions, 32 arrival and 34 departure flights were cancelled at the source or destination airports.

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The minimum temperature fell by over 1 degree and was 9.1 degrees Celsius against 10.6 degrees a day earlier. The Met department issued a yellow alert, expecting dense fog in isolated areas on Saturday and Sunday, along with a dip in the minimum temperature.The maximum temperature was 17.4 degrees Celsius, two notches below normal, against 17.1 on Thursday. India Meteorological Department predicted the maximum and minimum temperatures to be 17-19 and 6-8 degrees Celsius on Saturday.AQI was 270 at 12pm, which further improved to 236 by 4pm against 380 a day earlier at the same time. According to the weather department, the city saw winds with an average speed of 12kmph overnight that helped lift the fog and improve the air quality.

According to IITM's air quality early warning system, however, AQI is likely to deteriorate again. It is likely to be in the poor category till Saturday and may dip to very poor again from Sunday.Commission for Air Quality Management decided to revoke the restrictions under Graded Response Action Plan stage-III after they stayed imposed for 20 days since Dec 13. However, construction & demolition project sites that were issued specific closure orders for violations/non-compliance can't resume operations without a specific order, it added.11,377 challans issued in DecStepping up action against illegal and polluting activities, Municipal Corporation of Delhi has issued 11,377 challans for sanitation and municipal solid waste violations in Dec. According to MCD, the enforcement was intensified as GRAP stages III and IV remained in force for most of the month and penalties amounting to Rs 24.2 lakh were imposed, of which Rs 21.6 lakh has been recovered.The highest number of sanitation-related violations was recorded in Najafgarh zone, where 2,215 challans were issued, followed by 1,480 challans in Rohini, 1,271 in South, 1,109 in Shahdara South and 1,028 in City-Sadar Paharganj zones.MCD issued 766 challans for violations related to NGT norms and air pollution, imposing Rs 96 lakh in penalties. Central zone recorded the highest number of such challans at 285, followed by Najafgarh at 119, West at 82 and Narela at 77.Several illegally operating factories and dyeing units were sealed, most of them — 37 — in Shahdara North zone till Dec 23. Of them, 17 were jeans dyeing units. MCD formed over 500 teams in 12 zones for the anti-pollution drive, besides deploying additional machinery, sanitation workers and waste-collection vehicles to clean garbage-vulnerable locations and restore hygiene. Around 500 secondary collection points are being cleared at night.From the funds under National Clean Air Programme, 14 mechanical road sweepers will be bought in batches by Jan 31. Four more sweepers can also be procured using central funds. As part of dust mitigation measures, water sprinkling has been intensified using 28 anti-smog guns and 167 water sprinklers across all zones and jet machines are being used for washing major arterial roads.