India's capital chokes as air pollution levels hit 50 times the safe limit

[mahatmakanejeeves]

World News
India’s capital chokes as air pollution levels hit 50 times the safe limit


Office goers walk wearing a face mask amidst a thick layer of smog as air pollution shoots up in New Delhi, India, Monday, Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

By MANISH SWARUP and RISHI LEKHI
Updated 5:25 AM EST, November 18, 2024

NEW DELHI (AP) — Authorities in India’s capital shut schools, halted construction and banned non-essential trucks from entering the city on Monday after air pollution shot up to its worst level this season.

Residents of New Delhi woke up to thick, toxic smog enveloping the city of some 33 million as the air quality became increasingly hazardous. It rose further into the severe category, according to SAFAR, the country’s main environmental agency, which measures tiny particulate matter in the air that can enter deep into the lungs.

The deadly haze covered monuments and high-rise buildings in the capital, with visibility so low that airlines warned of delays.

In several areas of the city, pollution levels were more than 50 times higher than the World Health Organization’s recommended safe limit. Forecasts say the poor air quality will continue into the week.


A foreign tourist family walks wearing face mask amidst a thick layer of smog as air pollution shoots up in New Delhi, India, Monday, Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

{snip}

[nmmi]

1. Is a 'Green' Revolution Poisoning India's Capital? (trash incinerators operating with no effective regulations), NYT

Is a ‘Green’ Revolution Poisoning India’s Capital?, New York Times 11/9/24

Burning the garbage was supposed to help solve one of Delhi’s most startling environmental crises: the giant mountains of trash that soar nearly 200 feet into the air and eclipse the capital’s skyline — putrid, 20-story slopes of waste that collapse and crush people, or catch fire in noxious blazes that last for days. ((per the article, these trash mountains are a major national embarrassment -nmmi))

The government pushed a revolutionary plan. It promised to incinerate the trash safely in a state-of-the-art plant, turning the waste into electricity in an ingenious bid to tackle two major problems at once.
...
“The plant was never regulated, and the government knows,” Rakesh Kumar Aggarwal, a former manager at the plant, told The Times before he died in 2020, months after we started reporting this article and collecting samples for testing. He said basic safety measures were routinely skipped to save money and emissions from the facility went untreated, spewing dangerous chemicals into the heart of Delhi.

... And despite rules that prohibit the ash from being dumped in residential areas, open-bed trucks — often bearing the Delhi municipal government’s logo — have carted thousands of tons of incinerated trash to poorer neighborhoods on the capital’s outskirts for years. The wind kicks up their uncovered loads along the way.

Many of the trucks have climbed to the top of a knoll overlooking hundreds of homes, a playground and a Hindu temple. From there, the soot has come hurtling down toward the neighborhood below in black clouds, seeping into homes and settling like a gritty blanket that coats just about everything — floors, laundry, groceries, children’s toys.

More: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/is-a-green-revolution-poisoning-india-s-capital/ar-AA1tMydb

There was so much metal that impoverished families, known locally as ragpickers, sorted through the ash to salvage whatever they could, retching on the fumes as they worked. ... (the plant is supposed to sort out and remove metal, electronics, batteries, and other materials that cause toxic fumes, before incinerating the remainder, but per the article they don't bother).

While protests were once common against the plant, the government has clamped down on all demonstrations in Delhi in recent years.