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Understanding & solving the problem of Delhi's air pollution

Understanding & solving the problem of Delhi's air pollution

Health & Lifestyle

Ajay Singh

Ajay Singh

332 week ago — 5 min read

The same as consuming 50 cigarettes a day. This is the pollution level for the average person in Delhi. You don’t need to be a smoker to feel this kick. Thanks to air pollution, everyone who lives in Delhi NCR is effectively a chain smoker.

 

As usual we all will wear masks, stop sending children to school and wait for Lord Indra to to bring down rain to clear this killer smog. And this is in the time of 4G, iPhone X and the first robot citizen Sophia and people going to Mars and the Moon? We can plan to live on the Moon & Mars with less possibility of survival but we cannot find a cure for earth’s problems?

 

The primary rule of solving any problem is to identify the root cause.

 

1. Cars
Each and every person will blame cars as the main cause of pollution but which cars are pollute more? 
In India, diesel cars are killing air: An international study, testing on-road emissions of passenger cars in India, says a diesel SUV may be emitting 25 to 65 times more oxides of nitrogen (NOx) than a small petrol car. On-road emissions of diesel cars may also be far higher than their emissions under lab certification conditions, it adds.

The study, conducted by International Centre for Automotive Technology (ICAT), an Indian vehicle-testing agency, and International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) states that Delhi has more vehicles than Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai put together. Much of the vehicular air pollution can be avoided by maintaining proper speed of the vehicles. Vehicles standing on the road crossing or in traffic jams cause more pollution. The quantity of harmful emissions decreases with increasing speed. All this can be eliminated if we use CNG for our cars. Air pollution is not entirely a natural problem. It’s a manmade problem and we need to solve it by switching to CNG for cars and we can eliminate pollution at many levels.

 

2. Heavy use of diesel generators in NCR
You name any building and whether it is government or private, all have 100% power backup. Delhi is well fed with power but the situation in Gurgaon, Faridabad & Ghaziabad is bad where on average a diesel generator set runs for many hours nonstop producing toxic air. The same air conditioning in your building gives you really pleasant weather contributes to heat generation and toxic air pollution outside your building. We are the only ones responsible for it. 
This problem is again manmade and can be easily solved by using clean energy. Solar panels are a solution and they eliminate 95% CO2 and the cost starts less than an iPhone X.

 

Running your office or house on clean energy will not just save your cost it will also help in reducing your carbon footprint.

 

3. Dust particles

All over Delhi NCR heavy construction is in place, lakhs of flat and high rises are under construction. Again, a manmade problem and a manmade solution is to cover land with grass and grow trees. It will stop dust traveling form place to place. A tree in its lifetime can produce enough oxygen for us to breathe peacefully. We spend so much on Italian marble and woodwork. How about making a 10% budget strictly for having a lawn or vertical garden in every flat, So we can reduce our ecological footprints.

Everyone loves greenery, but very few people make efforts to make it compulsory to have plants in and around house.

A smart home running on solar power with a terrace garden or with lots of plants kept in flowerpots will not cost you much but will reduce your carbon footprint for sure.

 

You cannot clear all the smog in the air but you can start taking measures like adopting solar energy and bring down air pollution forever.

 

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Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views, official policy or position of GlobalLinker.

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