Mercury Hits Season’s Low At 15.8°C, Oct Coldest In 2 Yrs
NEW DELHI: Delhi saw the month’s fifth day of very poor air quality as the AQI rose to 321 on Sunday. A day earlier, it was 292 at 4 pm, which is in the poor category.
Mercury Hits Season’s Low At 15.8°C, Oct Coldest In 2 Yrs
Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) on Sunday did not release its daily 24-hour average AQI bulletin – it is released at 4 pm – till the filing of this report. CPCB’s Sameer app showed that Delhi’s AQI was last updated at 12 pm at 321. An official, who did not want to be named, said all stations were active and gathering data but due to a technical glitch, the data was not updated. The issue will be fixed soon, said the official. A similar technical glitch on Jan 1 meant that AQI data was unavailable. On Nov 14, 2023, data was available for only nine of the city’s 40 stations as Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) stations were unable to transmit readings to CPCB. Meanwhile, the Decision Support System (DSS), which estimates the contribution of various pollution sources in Delhi’s PM2.5 load, has shown that the rise in pollution was driven by transport emissions in Delhi and cross-boundary pollution. The share of stubble burning emissions reached a seasonal high of 3.71% on Sunday, when on Saturday it was 0.98%. Before this, the highest single-day contribution from farm fires was 3.45% on Friday. The DSS shows that the biggest contributor to PM2.5 – 20.6% – was in the “others” category. These are sources outside Delhi. This was followed by 15.5% from Delhi’s transport sector. Around 7.57% was estimated to be from Gautam Buddha Nagar. No major change is expected in the air quality on Monday, but the AQI may drop some notches on Tuesday due to the light rain. “The air quality is likely to be in the very poor category on Oct 27 and in the poor category on Oct 28-29,” the Air Quality Early Warning System for Delhi (EWS) has forecast. The minimum temperature also dropped to 15.8 degrees Celsius, the lowest for Oct in the last two years. It was 16.9 degrees Celsius a day earlier. IMD’s data for Safdarjung shows that the lowest minimum temperature around the same time last year was 17.4 degrees Celsius on Oct 15. The lowest night temperature in Oct 2023 was recorded at 14.3 degrees Celsius on Oct 28. IMD has forecast partly cloudy skies on Wednesday when the Delhi govt plans to conduct artificial rain. “A feeble western disturbance is likely to impact the city from Monday onwards,” said an official, explaining why light rain is expected.