Environment Ministry to undertake major reforms to improve air quality in urban areas

On Monday,  15th Finance Commission headed by N. K. Singh and including its members and senior officials held a detailed meeting with Union Minister for Environment Prakash Javadekar, senior officers on issues relating to Air Quality (AQ) especially that in urban areas.

Javadekar states pre-requisite for ambient AQ

During meeting, Javadekar said his ministry was coming up with rules for implementation of construction and demolition waste control so as to control dust, a major source of pollution in cities. He opined that strict implementation of pollution and emission laws with harsh punishment and penalties to defaulters is pre-requisite for ambient air quality.

minister also informed that with launching National AQ Index in 2015, country has reliable data of AQ with respect to 42 million-plus cities from 2017 onwards. 

An official press release stated that  XVFC Report 2020-2021 was first time that any Commission has given attention to air quality (AQ) as a major focus and this FC had t only recommended grants for 2020-21 and also provided a road map for its award period.

objective of meeting was to discuss status of implementation of Finance Commission recommendations for 2020-21 for administering grants to improve air quality in million-plus cities. Finance Commission, in its report for Financial Year 2020-2021, had recommended grants of Rs 4,400 crore for 2020-21 to improve ambient air quality in fifty million-plus cities and Urban Agglomerations (UAs).

For this, Ministry of Environment, Forest, and Climate Challenge has been entrusted with responsibility to facilitate desired outcomes through se urban local bodies.

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According to press release,  Commission was given following information: 

• Regarding reliable data on AQ measurement, it was explained that re is a network of around 984 stations covering a wide range of cities and towns, around 779 manual stations and 205 continuous monitoring stations in around 500 cities which were set up under National Control of Air Pollution (NACP) to meet its objectives. Although a network of AQI monitoring stations is in place, re is a need for strengning and expanding se along with geographical area to cover air-shed areas in order to make it more robust and accurate. 
• Ministry has begun this work earlier as part of roll-out of NACP and various think-tanks like IITs, IIMs and NITs have been made local partners for different cities/towns. Ministry will also seek ir expert guidance on what Commission needs to consider for five years from 2021.
• As problem of AQ is mostly t a localized phemen and is influenced by many factors beyond control of a particular region, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) is w focusing on air-shed manment approach.
• Construction & Demolition Waste Manment was a priority of Government and that Government would seek support of Commission for same.

Basic structural change in sources of air quality

Javadekar added that re would be a basic structural change in sources of air quality in next few years and particularly in larger cities of country due to new regime to emission rms which would lead to an estimated reduction of 30 to 40 per cent in vehicular emission.

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He also briefed about various reforms that are being taken up by Ministry at a break-neck speed and stated that time delays in approval of application/licenses were drastically brought down from earlier 640 days to 108 days w. Furr, this period will be brought down to 50 days within next six months. As regards ease of doing business, Ministry is coming up with an amendment to tification of environment impact assessment. 

Commission unilaterally appreciated Ministry’s effort in building up capacity to monitor Air Quality.  Commission also stressed on need for controlling agricultural pollution.

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