Today, as we mark World Environment Day through the #BeatPlasticPollution campaign with the theme “Ecosystem Restoration,” we are reminded that people’s action on plastic pollution matters.
Whether it’s polluting our landscapes or choking marine life, lightweight plastic is a major threat to the global environment and requires immediate action.

Plastic is now a ubiquitous pollutant. Plastic waste is found everywhere, from the remotest corners of the earth to the deepest trenches of the oceans. Time is ticking on PLASTIC BOMB, and when the equivalent of more than 2,000 garbage trucks full of plastic are dumped into our oceans, rivers and lakes every day, it puts nature into emergency mode.

World Environment Day has been celebrated year after year since 1973, 50 years ago, as a global initiative to raise awareness and inspire action to protect and preserve the environment. Are we really serious about protecting and preserving the environment? Today we will talk about it, but what about tomorrow?
Where are we today, let me give you a quick glance on the same. (Source United Nations)
 More than 400 million tonnes of plastic is produced every year worldwide, half of which is designed to be used only once. Of that, less than 10 per cent is recycled.
 An estimated 19-23 million tonnes end up in lakes, rivers and seas annually. That is approximately the weight of 2,200 Eiffel Towers all together.
 Microplastics – tiny plastic particles up to 5mm in diameter – find their way into food, water and air. It is estimated that each person on the planet consumes more than 50,000 plastic particles per year –and many more if inhalation is considered.
 Discarded or burnt single-use plastic harms human health and biodiversity and pollutes every ecosystem from mountain tops to the ocean floor.
 With available science and solutions to tackle the problem, governments, companies and other stakeholders must scale up and speed actions to solve this crisis.
In our everyday lives today, plastic has many valuable uses, but our reliance on single-use plastic products has increased, with serious environmental, social, economic and health consequences. Every day, one million plastic bottles are purchased every minute around the world, and approximately five trillion plastic bags are used worldwide every year.

Through the regular use of single-use plastic, fossil and human activities on Earth today have so impacted the environment that significant geological change and a new marine microbial habitat, the “plastisphere”, have emerged – an ecosystem that has adapted to the man-made plastic environment.

So how did we get here?
In the early 1950s to 1970s, only a small amount of plastic was produced and used, so plastic waste was relatively manageable. However, in the decades between the 1970s and the 1990s, the production and use of plastics more than tripled. At the beginning of the 20th century, the amount of plastic waste produced increased at an alarming rate beyond the levels of the previous 40 years. Today, we produce about 400 million tonnes of plastic waste every year.

Of the nearly seven billion tonnes of plastic waste generated worldwide, only less than 10% has been recycled. Millions of tonnes of plastic waste are either lost in the environment or sometimes transported thousands of kilometres to third world countries where they are incinerated or landfilled, further exacerbating climatic conditions and global warming. Systemic change is needed to stop the flow of plastic waste into the environment.
But it is not too late to mend our ways. We must heed the call of Mother Earth and strive to live sustainably. Now that the world has recognised the problem and governments, industry and other stakeholders are beginning to act. We have seen many positive actions, but the truth is that we all need to do more and stop PLASTIC BOMB at the source. Systemic change is needed to stop the flow of plastic waste into the environment.
All this underlines how important this World Environment Day is in mobilising transformative action in all parts of the world. Today, protecting the environment is everyone’s responsibility. Small actions by individuals can together make a big impact. UNEP has called on people to eliminate plastic as much as possible and move to a circular economy. It has also called on people to join the #BeatPlasticPollution online campaign and share their initiatives and solutions to tackle plastic pollution. The steps that governments and companies are taking to fight plastic pollution are the result of this action.
It is time to change the way we produce, consume and dispose of plastic. Ultimately, the problem of plastic pollution requires concerted efforts by governments, industry and individuals to reduce plastic consumption, improve recycling infrastructure and promote sustainable practices.

SURESH RATHOD

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The Indo-Gangetic Plainis located South and upwind of the Himalayan foothills. The region is associated with high aerosol loading, much of which is black carbon and dust, and thus provides an opportunity for studying how aerosol  affects extreme rainfall events, particularly when air mass is forced from a low elevation to a higher elevation as it moves over rising terrain technically called orographic forcing.

A team of researchers from National Institute of Technology Rourkela, Leipzig Institute for Meteorology (LIM), University of Leipzig, Germany, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur supported by the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India under DST Climate Change program have highlighted the crucial role of the aerosol direct radiative effect on high precipitation events over the Himalayan region. The findings of the current work have been accepted for publishing in the scientific journal ‘Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics’ recently.

They showed that particulate emissions can alter the physical and dynamical properties of cloud systems and, in turn, amplify rainfall events over orographic regions downwind of highly polluted urban areas.

The study used 17 years (2001–2017) of rainfall rate, aerosol measurements called aerosol optical depth (AOD), meteorological reanalysis fields such as pressure, temperature, and moisture content at different altitudes are used to compute the thermodynamic variable “moist static energy” and outgoing long-wave radiation from Indian region to investigate high precipitation events on the foothills of the Himalayas. The team found clear associations between high precipitation events, high aerosol loading, and high moist static energy (MSE) values (Moist static energy of an air mass includes the potential energy due to its height above the ground and the latent heat due to its moisture content). The findings also highlight the crucial role of the radiative effect of aerosol on high precipitation events over the Himalayan region.

The results of the study indicate that aerosols can play a vital role in exciting high precipitation (HP) events over the Himalayas during the monsoon season. Thus, aerosols, including chemistry, are essential to consider when forecasting HP events over the Himalayan region in regional modelling studies.

Figure 1. Map of Global Multi-resolution Terrain Elevation Data 2010 (GMTED2010) in kilometers, provided by the US Geological Survey. Thin black lines mark country borders. The black rectangle marks the domain on the foothills of the Himalayas that was used in this study.

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In the past, CPCB observed froth formation and increase in ammonia levels in river Yamuna because of discharge of untreated sewage, non-operation of existing Sewage Treatment Plants, improper functioning of Effluent Treatment Plants(ETPs) installed by the industries and Common Effluent Treatment Plants(CETPs) located on the banks of river Yamuna.

Monitoring of 22 drains carried out recently ,indicated that 14 drains (Sonia Vihar, Najafgarh, Shastri Park, Shahdara, etc.) are found untapped ,discharging sewage. While 05 drains are 100% tapped and no flow at downward of interception observed,02 drains were found tapped but overflow into river yamuna was observed. One drain (drain no. 14) has no flow at all. Due to partially/untreated discharge of sewage and industrial effluent containing phosphorus, many times, foaming also is observed.

CPCB, taking cognizance of this, issued directions to Delhi Jal Board to submit time bound action plan to ensure compliance to norms by STPs and that no untreated sewage is discharged to these drains.

Delhi Pollution Control Committe(DPCC) has been directed to take action against non-complying Common Effluent Treatment Plans(CETPs) and industrial units. Similar directions have also been issued to State Pollution Control Boards of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.

In view of the importance of the issues, reminders have been issued today to concerned agencies to submit action taken report by 15th December, 2020.

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As per the study it has been found that there has been a drastic reduction of up to 50% in the Air Quality Parameters such as PM10, PM2.5, PM1 and Gaseous particles of NO2, SO2 CO & OZONE as well as in Volatile Organic Compound VOC/BTX  such as Benzene, Toulene, Xylene and NH3. The Amity AXAPC team looked at 24 hourly averages of ambient Air Quality from the averaged quality monitors from CPCB monitoring stations in and around Delhi & NCR.

It was revealed that on 22/03/2020 of PM10, PM2.5, NO2, SO2 CO, OZONE, had measured 98, 62, 23, 13, 08, 40 µg/m3 (Except CO-mg/m3) respectively and  VOC/BTX – Benzene, Toulene, Xylene and NH3 measured 10, 18, 25 and 11 µg/m3 respectively almost 50% that of the levels on 21^st March.. Amity University Haryana AUH has a highly sophisticated Air Quality Monitoring Station at its campus at Pachgaon, Manesar that itself looks at the Air Pollution parameters at the doorsteps of the millennium city of Gurugram. AUH further has the NASA Aeronet Monitor that looks at ultrafine aerosol particles and their concentration in air. These particles can travel great distances, even across continent weather currents.

“It is important to keep the ambient Air Quality in healthy conditions during the Coronavirus crisis as the respiratory diseases and heart strokes are greatly impacted by degraded Air Quality” says Prof PB Sharma, Vice Chancellor, Amity University Haryana. The safe limit for Air Quality as per the WHO is to keep the particulate matter PM2.5 below 20mg/m3 while India during most of time of the year records PM 2.5 higher than 100mg/m3 which is 5 times higher than the global safe limit.

The nationwide Janta Curfew undoubtedly brought the particulate matter such as PM2.5 to 62 mg/m3. It may be mentioned that Air Pollution has been found to harm human being from head to toe. The ultrafine particles of particulate matter and Volatile organic Compounds such of Benzene and ammonia pass through the lungs and are carried into the bloodstream to expose virtually to all cells in the body.

As per WHO report an estimated 7 million deaths worldwide are associated with Air Pollution and this cause of mortality due to Air Pollution accounts for 11.6% of all global deaths. WHO further recognizes that Air Pollution is a critical risk factor for non-communicable diseases (NCDs), causing an estimated one quarter (24%) of all adult deaths from heart disease, 25% from stroke, 43% from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and 29% from lung cancer.

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In the last few days, more than 13 thousand passengers canceled the journey in view of the late temperatures of the national capital and the surrounding areas due to very low temperatures and fog. By Wednesday, 13,412 passengers had canceled their tickets. Trains coming from distant places like Duronto, Rajdhani, Malda, New Delhi, Farakka Express, Mumbai, Amritsar Express are in bad shape.

Along with Delhi, fog has been engulfed in many areas of Punjab on Friday morning. Apart from this, dense fog enveloped some areas of Rajasthan, Eastern Uttar Pradesh, East Madhya Pradesh and Tripura.

These trains are running late

The Jabalpur Nizamuddin Mahakoshal Express is running late by 5 hours. The Nanded Amritsar Sachkhand Express is running 6 hours late. Lokmanya Tilak-Haridwar Express (5 hours late). Vasco-Nizamuddin-Goa Express (2 hours late), Chennai-New Delhi GT Express (02.30 hours late), Rewa-Anand Vihar Reva Express (2 hours late), Bhubaneswar-New Delhi Rajdhani (3 hours late), Howrah- New Delhi Purva Express (3 hours late), Bhagalpur Anandvihar Vikramshila Express (2 hours late).

Pollution in Delhi at critical level

At the same time, the pollution situation in Delhi also remains serious. According to data from Delhi Pollution Control Board, AQI 418 was recorded in Anand Vihar which falls in the serious category. There was AQI 372 in RKpuram which falls in the ‘very poor’ category. At the same time, AQI 429 (Gambhir) was recorded in Rohini.

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The reason behind this is a western disturbance on the western side of Himalayas which is going to impact the flow of air in Delhi-NCR regions.

The reduced flow of air is likely to lead to an increase in the accumulation of pollutants in the region and on 21 and 22 November the situation could worsen even further.

Apart from Delhi, Noida, Gurugram, Faridabad, and Ghaziabad too are going to be affected by the worsening air quality.The Air Quality Index (AQI) in Delhi had improved since Saturday when it was marked at 357.

Meanwhile Hollywood star Leonardo DiCaprio has expressed concern over the rising levels of pollution in India’s national capital through a post on Instagram.

The 45-year-old actor also  shared a post by Extinction Rebellion, a global climate movement, on the social media site.

The post gives details of a protest organised in New Delhi by climate activist groups Extinction Rebellion India, LetMeBreathe, FridaysForFuture India and others.

Yesterday in Lok Sabha discusses ways to curb Delhi air pollution, and mps say farmers should not be vilified for burning stubble: Congress leader Manish Tewari said a committee, similar to the panel on public undertakings and estimates, should be set up to look into pollution.

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Earlier, Priyanka Chopra had posted a similar picture when she was in the capital city for the shoot of her forthcoming film The White Tiger. Now, with Jacqueline also raising her voice in the matter warrants some attention.

The Supreme Court on Friday said in spite of Odd-Even vehicle rationing scheme, pollution has reached a severe level, and again called the Chief Secretaries of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, to report on measures taken to curb air pollution particularly related to stubble burning.

Meanwhile The air quality in Delhi improved much today with many areas recording Air Quality Index (AQI) in the “moderate” group and most school reopen today after two-day break. 

According to the Air Quality Index (AQI) data by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), the major pollutants PM 2.5 was recorded at 188 and PM 10 at 174 in Lodhi Road, Aya Nagar docked at 103, Burari crossing at 183 and CRRI Mathura road recorded 192 air quality levels.

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On Friday with air quality in several areas dipping to ‘severe-plus’ pollution levels even as the Delhi government kept up suspense on extending the odd-even car rationing scheme on its 12th and last day.

At 7 am, the air quality in several areas of the Delhi and NCR, including Pusa Road (777), Dwarka Sector 8 (930), Pragati Vihar (733), Anand Vihar (535), Noida Sector 125 (665), Noida Sector 62 (538), US Embassy in Chanakyapuri (660), Jahagirpuri (610), Narela (808), Bawana (865), Okhla (722), Satyawati College in Ashok Vihar (757), Sonia Vihar (565), Alipur (644), Sri Aurobindo Marg (733), Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business in Rohini (765) and Patparganj (571) crossed the ‘severe-plus’ category.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is scheduled to discuss a press conference at noon today, a day after saying the odd-even scheme could be extended beyond November 15 “if the need arises”.

He also appealed to opposition parties, which have termed the scheme an “election stunt” of the AAP government, to shun their resistance to the scheme. “Pollution has increased drastically. All of Delhi is demanding odd-even. At such a time, the Opposition should support the people’s wish,” he said.

“If the need arises, we will extend it (odd-even scheme),” Kejriwal said in response to media queries on whether the initiative for curbing vehicular pollution will be extended.

A PIL against the car-rationing scheme is already pending in court with the Supreme Court directing the Centre, Delhi government and Central Pollution Control Board to bring on record the pollution data for the national capital for the month of October till November 14. It had also sought pollution data from October to December of the last year. The matter is scheduled to be heard on Friday.

Kejriwal has blamed stubble burning in neighbouring states for repeated episodes of smog in Delhi and said it has hit Delhi’s reputation worldwide. The chief minister said Delhi’s neighbouring states, especially Haryana and Punjab, are burning crop residue disregarding strict directions from the Supreme Court.

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Talking to reporters in Patna after a high-level meeting on pollution control chaired by the Chief Minister, Chief Secretary Deepak Kumar said the restriction on vehicles more than 15 years old has also been extended to commercial vehicles “only for the Patna metropolitan area”.

He also said that private vehicles have been exempted from the ban, though owners would be required to get fresh pollution tests done and get certificates for which intensive drive will be carried out from Tuesday.

the restrictions will come into force with immediate effect and stay in place until further orders. Also, mandatory fresh pollution checks have been ordered for auto-rickshaws in view of reports that many three-wheelers ran on kerosene and emitted copious fumes”, the Chief Secretary said.

As a long-term measure, the government is thinking about encouraging conversion of all diesel-run auto-rickshaws to CNG-driven ones or, if possible, to use electricity. Subsidies may also be given for those opting for such a change. This is in the pipeline.

A final plan of action will be shared later, he said. Additionally, it was decided at the meeting that to minimise pollution caused by construction activities, all sites shall be duly covered with sprinkling of water carried out at regular intervals, he said.

Trucks and pick-up vans involved in collection of garbage have also been strictly instructed to keep the trash covered on their way to dumping sites, he added.

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The Supreme Court said “If stubble burning takes place, the entire administration — from the Chief Secretary to the gram pradhan will be responsible”, the court said, ordering a slew of measures to bring the pollution in check. The court also sought a road-map from the Centre and the governments of Delhi, Punjab and Haryana to stop pollution on long-term. “People are dying and it can’t happen in a civilised country… Every time we are passing orders for the current issue. We have to pass orders for long-term measures,” the court said. The top court has summoned chief secretaries of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday.

The court said “Stubble burning must stop. Both Centre and the state must do this. People are dying. The sad thing is everyone in this country is interested in gimmicks,” the court said while hearing a petition from the pollution control body Environment Pollution Control Authority or EPCA on stubble burning in neighbouring states like Punjab and Haryana.

The state machinery is not acting to control pollution, the court said. “The Centre should do… Delhi must do. It can’t go on like this,” the court said, adding, “The time has come to fix responsibility for the situation that is destroying the Right to Life of citizens in gross violation of Article 21… Everybody has to be answerable — from the state to gram panchayats”.

The two-judge bench comprising Justices Arun Mishra and Deepak Gupta  also held the state governments responsible for the situation. “They are interested in electioneering… they are answerable…  we will not tolerate this,” they said.

The court said wide publicity has to be given to its orders on pollution through radio, television and print media, so panchayats are aware of their responsibilities.

Delhi was grilled over its odd-even road rationing scheme which came into force on Monday. “What are you achieving by odd and even? Are you preventing running of taxis? Have you any figure on impact of odd and even?” the court asked.

The Centre said four districts in Punjab contribute to 44 per cent of stubble burning and in Delhi, construction and demolition are major sources of pollution.

The court ordered  a stop to construction and demolition work across Delhi and tasked municipal authorities with ensuring that there is no violation. A fine of Rs. 1 lakh was ordered in cases of violation.

The entry of diesel vehicles and garbage burning were also banned in the national capital. To prevent road dust, the court ordered that water be sprinkled on roads and traffic be planned, so any congestion is taken care of by the Delhi Traffic Police.

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