Fri Oct 25 17:55:59 UTC 2024: Updated – October 25, 2024 11:26 pm IST – BengaluruA study conducted by the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) has identified 80 hotspots within Bengaluru Urban District (BUD) where pollution emissions of the most lethal and dominant pollutant PM2.5 exceeds critical thresholds.
The study was conducted in the entire BUD measuring 2,196 square kilometres (sq. km.) and for the first time in the country, drone-based video and photo imaging technology combined with Artificial Intelligence-based Machine Learning (AIML) was used in the field of emission science.
According to the study the dominant source for these hotspots comprised industrial zones, traffic junctions, construction sites and solid waste management facilities. The top ten hotspots were Baganipura Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) processing plant, Sankey Road, KCDC MSW, Hebbal, Mekhri Circle, Bommasandra, Mavallipura MSW, Jigani, Shanthinagar, and Veerasandra. Of the 10 hotspots six are transport, one is industrial and three are MSW processing plants.Gufran Beig, Ashutosh Mukherjee chair professor, NIAS, said that 300 drone sorties were carried out and the spatial geographical distribution of particulate emissions for the year 2023-24 was accomplished with ultra-fine resolution of 200 mm for the first time.
He added that while earlier studies focused on the BBMP region with coarser resolution and used secondary data which involves significant uncertainty and also ignored several potential sources, the current study found that the total annual particulate emissions for BUD for PM2.5 is 68.6Gg/year and for the BBMP region it is 41.7Gg/year for base year 2023-24.
The BBMP emission contribution in BUD is around 61% it said.
It further said that the transport sector has emerged as the most dominant contributor of PM2.5 accounting to 39% in BUD region whereas transport share in BBMP region is 48%.
“Two wheeler population is found to make 70% of the total fleet of vehicles in the BUD region. This is one of the major reasons for congestion as they enter in any mini holes in traffic lines and break the flow. However two wheelers contribute 11% of PM2.5 emissions, followed by cars population at 22% but contributing 20% of PM2.5 emissions,” states the study findings.Other findings include, textile plants making up around 22 % of the total industries in the BUD region while contributing 44% of the emissions.
Though only 19% of the industries in the BUD region use wood for process heating, 51 % of the PM2.5 emissions are from wood combustion.
The study has also made recommendations which include separate lanes for slow speed vehicles, creating bus bays, providing affordable metro fares, integration of metro and dedicated bus service, regular sweeping of secondary and tertiary roads and transition to mechanical sweeping among others.
Published – October 25, 2024 11:25 pm IST
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