'Maha to enter 'highly vulnerable' red zone for aerosol pollution in 2023'

Aerosol pollution in Maharashtra is likely to move to highly vulnerable red zone from the current vulnerable orange zone in 2023 which may lead to drop in visibility levels and pose a host of health problems for its citizens a study revealedAs per a release issued by Asar an organisation working for environmental causes high aerosol amounts include particulate matter PM25 and PM10 comprising sea salt dust sulphate black and organic carbonIf inhaled these substances can be harmful to peoples health it saidAerosol optical depth AOD is the quantitative estimate of the aerosol present in the atmosphere and it can be used as a proxy measurement of PM25The study titled A deep insight into statelevel aerosol pollution in India conducted by Associate Professor Dr Abhijit Chatterjee and PhD scholar Monami Dutta from Bose Institute Kolkata provides an insight into aerosol pollution with the longterm 20052019 trend source apportionment and future scenario 2023 for various statesAlso read Maharashtra govt transfers 109 DCP and SPrank officersMaharashtra currently falls under the orange vulnerable zone with AOD between 04 and 05 However rising aerosol pollution is expected to push the AOD above 05 which is the red zone highly vulnerable Dr Chatterjee the studys principal author saidThe AOD values range from 0 to 10 with 0 indicating a crystal clear sky and maximum visibility while 1 signifies hazy conditions the study statedAOD of less than 03 fall under the green zone safe 03 to 04 is blue zone less vulnerable 04 to 05 is orange vulnerable and above 05 is red zone highly vulnerable it saidAir pollution in Maharashtra has mostly been influenced by coalbased thermal power plants TPP Their capacity is increasing with the rise in demand for electricity However if the state continues to install TPPs as observed in the past it would enter the highly vulnerable zone which could result in an increase in morbidity rate drop in life expectancy and a host of health issues for people of the state Dr Chatterjee saidMaharashtra can witness an AOD rise of about 7 per cent between 2019 and 2023 he saidThe study has identified thermal power plants solid fuel burning and vehicular emissions as main sources of aerosol pollution in the state he saidEmissions from thermal power plants increased from 31 per cent to 39 per cent between 2005 and 2019 mainly due to the increase in capacity and dependence on coalbased power generation the study statedMaharashtra needs to turn down the capacity of thermal power plants by 41 per cent 10 GW to move to the blue zone author of the study Monami Dutta saidThe state government should not only restrict sanctioning of new thermal power plants but should also focus on reducing the current capacity by at least 10 GW she saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever