Anatomy of the winter 2017 air quality emergency in Delhi

Beig, Gufran, Srinivas, Reka ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6194-5871, Parkhi, Neha S., Carmichael, G. R., Singh, Siddhartha, Sahu, Saroj K., Rathod, Aditi and Maji, Sujit (2019) Anatomy of the winter 2017 air quality emergency in Delhi. Science of the Total Environment, 681. pp. 305-311. ISSN 0048-9697

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Abstract

The Indian capital Delhi experienced an environmental emergency in early November 2017 when levels of toxic PM2.5 particles surpassed WHO guidelines by 25 times (11 times by Indian Standards) for a prolonged period of a week (peak 24 h average ~650 μg/m3). We hereby demonstrate the role that monsoon dynamics played in linking and mixing dust emitted from a large natural dust storm, 3000 km away in the Middle East, with smoke from agriculture fires in northwest India. This dust and smoke rich air was then transported to Delhi where, under stagnant conditions, it mixed with local emissions resulting in very high pollution levels. The heavy aerosol-laden air altered the land-skin surface air temperature difference resulting in increased surface wind speeds, favouring faster dispersion and an unusual sharp decline in PM2.5 (PM2.5–110 μg/m3). Understanding the multi-scale nature of such events is important in improving our abilities to forecast these events and in developing effective air quality management strategies for the mega cities.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	Funding Information: Authors are thankful to Dr. M. Rajeevan and Dr. Ravi Namjundiah for the ardent encouragement and motivation for this study. The work is the part of India's first air quality early warning system project SAFAR (System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and research) of IITM funded by Indian Union Ministry of Earth Sciences. Funding Information: Authors are thankful to Dr. M. Rajeevan and Dr. Ravi Namjundiah for the ardent encouragement and motivation for this study. The work is the part of India's first air quality early warning system project SAFAR (System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and research) of IITM funded by Indian Union Ministry of Earth Sciences . Publisher Copyright: © 2019 Elsevier B.V.
Uncontrolled Keywords:	air quality,delhi,dust storm,monsoon,pm particles,environmental engineering,environmental chemistry,waste management and disposal,pollution,sdg 11 - sustainable cities and communities ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/2300/2305
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences
Related URLs:	http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?...
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	04 Nov 2022 09:30
Last Modified:	27 Oct 2023 02:14
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/89583
DOI:	10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.04.347

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