New Delhi: Air pollution control in south Indian states needs an airshed level approach and a CAQM-like body, said a new report by Bengaluru-based think tank Centre for Study of Science, Technology and Policy. After modelling pollution levels in each of the five south Indian states, the report found that only about 38-65% of pollution was local, with the rest transported from other states.
“Air pollution in South India often receives far less attention than the severe pollution levels in northern and central India,” said the report, released on August 20.
CSTEP researchers studied the internal sources of air pollution in each of the south Indian states – Telangana, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala – and also analysed how much of their pollution comes from other states, transported by wind or other factors.
They found that in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, more than 50% of their air pollution is from outside their state borders. Meanwhile, in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, around 65% of their pollution is from within the state. This indicates the need for broader airshed level pollution action plans rather than individual state policies.
“Based on the modelling results, a regional cooperation framework can be built, in which these states work in sync to develop aligned clean air policies,” said the report.
The study also mentioned that 25 out of 131 non-attainment cities in the Union government’s National Clean Air Programme, 2019, are in South India. These include cities like Guntur, Ellore, Visakhapatnam, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Chennai. However, unlike North India and the Indo-Gangetic Plain, where wintertime stubble burning contributes to a fair share of the pollution, in South India the sources are distinct and more varied, the CSTEP study explained.
Three main sources of air pollution in South Indian states are solid fuel for cooking, industrial sources like factories and manufacturing units, and energy sources like fossil fuel generation and combustion. By understanding the sources and the ability of the polluted air to move from one state to another, the CSTEP report said that state governments can design their pollution policies accordingly.
“Some states export more pollution than they receive, while others absorb more than they contribute to the region,” said the report.
Why CAQM for South India?
One of the main recommendations provided by the CSTEP report was to establish a CAQM-like organisation for south Indian states. The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) is an inter-state organisation that works across Delhi NCR states like Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.
The CAQM was established in 2021 to oversee air pollution mitigation actions through an airshed management approach; this means that rather than treating pollution in different North Indian states in silos, it is treated as a comprehensive, multi-state issue.
According to CSTEP, south Indian states of Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh too can benefit from this approach.
This is because currently, air pollution policies are disparately spread across all states. While Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh have banned solid fuel burning, other states have not. Kerala has no policy to install pollution devices in MSMEs, while the other states do. In the transport sector, some states have policies to scrap older, diesel vehicles but others don’t.
“Effective air quality management increasingly depends on planning across sectors, rather than isolated, sector-specific interventions,” said the report.