New Delhi: Delhi govt is set to revive its real-time source apportionment study. To be led by IIT-Delhi, the proposed study spanning five years will mainly focus on identifying and quantifying pollution sources impacting the level of particulate matter (PM) 10 in Delhi’s air.Delhi environment minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa, who chaired a high-level meeting on Wednesday, has directed officials to expedite the process for approval to ensure that the study — a high-resolution air quality monitoring method — is launched at the earliest. “It will help us understand factors driving pollution in the city, the sources, and the interventions that are delivering results on the ground,” he said.In 2023, Delhi govt had roped in IIT-Kanpur, which conducted a real-time source apportionment study called ‘R-aasman’, focusing on PM2.5. However, this study was discontinued. “The proposals were pending for a long time under the previous govt and then shelved,” said a govt official on Wednesday.Currently, Delhi has a lone source apportionment system, known as Decision Support System, run by Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune, which estimates various local and regional sources impacting the city’s PM2.5 levels.
However, the system is operational only during winter.While IITM is already working on PM2.5 monitoring, there was a prior commitment under the action plan to also take up a study of PM10 in a focused manner, the official said. In line with this, a decision to move forward with the study was taken at Wednesday’s meeting, which was attended by officials of the environment department, Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) and IIT-Delhi.“The proposed study, spanning five years, aims to move beyond episodic and retrospective pollution assessments by introducing continuous, real-time source apportionment of airborne pollutants, especially PM10. This will empower policymakers with actionable insights during peak-pollution episodes and enable long-term evaluation of interventions,” said Sirsa.An important feature of the project is the reoperationalisation of the DPCC supersite (main laboratory for the study), supported by advanced instrumentation and integrated with mobile monitoring units for hotspot management.
The supersite will have advanced instrumentation, including ceilometers, GHG analysers and multi-channel samplers, to distinguish meteorological effects from local emissions.It will conduct comparative assessments using IIT-Delhi’s Sonipat site and the Delhi supersite to understand regional pollution dynamics. It will also use a mobile van equipped with instruments to monitor hotspots and other key areas at a given time to identify hyperlocal sources. The project is expected to cover all major hotspots, with at least 30 days of seasonal sampling per hotspot and continuous operations at the supersite.
