Abstract
Abstract. People effected due to air pollution in India rose by almost 150% during 1990 to 2015. Diwali event is one of the major anthropogenic source contributing to the air pollution. The study focuses on spatial and temporal distribution of trace gases emitted during pre, on and post diwali days and identify areas with high concentration using station measured and satellite derived data during 2008-2017. The ground measured data shows that during diwali days, NO2, SO2, CO & O3 concentration is almost 1.5 to 7 times the NAAQ safety limits over major cities particularly in northern, western and eastern India. Central and southern India experience low to moderate increase in pollution concentration. Spatial distribution over diwali days using satellite data reveal that NO2 values over India are mostly below NAAQ standards, however high range are observed (27–48 μg/m3) over Delhi, Punjab, Haryana region (Northern zones), Western, central and Eastern Indo-Gangetic plain and this concentration is seen denser on diwali days compared to pre and post diwali. The observation reveal that SO2 concentration is below safety levels over almost entire country except few cities like Delhi region, part of Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Kolkata region. CO concentration is at higher level than NAAQ standards over Western, central and Eastern Indo-gangetic plain. The regression shows that the satellite derived values are in close agreement with the ground measured over the diwali days. The analysis conclude that the peak of the pollutants during diwali may not be increasing quite drastically over many parts of the cities but the overall spatial distribution of the pollutants is increasing from ‘moderate’ to ‘moderately high’ range.
Highlights
1.1 BackgroundIn recent years, there has been concern about the degradation of air quality and its subsequent effect on human health, and one of the reasons of its increase is due to the use of fireworks during festivals and celebrations
24-hourly values of PM10 in 2002-2007 period were 3.6 times higher than prescribed limits of National Ambient Air Quality Standards as well as for NO2 values that was extremely higher in 2004 and 2007. These results indicate that fireworks during the diwali festival affected the ambient air quality adversely due to emission and accumulation of PM2.5, PM10, SO2, and NO2 (Singh et al, 2010)
It is revealed that for almost all zones across India, SO2 concentration is under NAAQ safety standards (80 μg/m3 for 24hrs average), except in case of the Byrasandra, Tavarekere & Madiwala (BTM Layout) Bengaluru (Southern zone) during 2014
Summary
There has been concern about the degradation of air quality and its subsequent effect on human health, and one of the reasons of its increase is due to the use of fireworks during festivals and celebrations. The potassium nitrate present in these fireworks releases pollutant such as SO2, NO2, and PM10, increasing their concentrations and massively degrading the air quality within a short time, which is associated with serious health impacts (Haque & Singh, 2017). India has the world’s highest deaths of 1.81 million due to the air pollution followed by China 1.58 million (Lancet, 2015) estimating a GDP loss of 1.3% in developing countries compared to 0.5% in developed countries Most of these deaths are caused by heat diseases, stroke, lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and upper respiratory tract infection. The levels of these pollutants observed during diwali were found to be higher due to adverse meteorological conditions, i.e.,. The present study tries to understand the spatio-temporal variability using satellite data and analyze the trend of concentration of air pollutants (NOx, CO, O3 & SO2), over various cities, divided into different zones across India, during pre, on and post diwali period for the 10 years (2008-2017)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
