Smog Shuts Down New Delhi

Air pollution in the New Delhi area of India has been building for weeks. The metropolitan area is home to 55 million people, and by Monday, 18 November, it was in an emergency situation as the air quality index reached 1,600.

Schools shifted to online instruction only, construction projects halted, and only trucks carrying essential cargo are allowed in the city. Diesel trucks are not allowed to operate, and many workers are staying home as the states in the area enter what the Indian government calls Level 4 of the Graded Response Action Plan GRAP.

The GRAP Level 4 measures include:

• All trucks except those carrying essential items are barred from entering Delhi.
  
  
• All commercial vehicles registered outside Delhi are barred from entering the city, though there is an exception for EVs and those running on cleaner fuels.
  
  
• All construction activities, including work on roads, flyovers, power lines, pipelines and other public projects, are halted.
  
  
• Schools switch to online teaching for all students, except for grades 10 and 12, with all other in-person classes being suspended.
  
  
• All employers, both state and private, in Delhi have been advised to have only 50 percent of their workforces come into their offices, with the rest working from home.
  
  
• Authorities may also order federal government employees to work from home.

India’s Supreme Court issued a blistering directive at the governmental agency responsible for air quality and directed that the Level 4 GRAP restrictions remain in place until the court rules they can be lifted. This means that local municipalities may not lift the restrictions if the air quality index in their area falls below the 450 threshold, which would initiate the looser Level 3 restrictions.

GRAP Level 4 is the highest level, so there are few new protocols for affected regions. One additional action being considered, but not announced as of publishing time, is the implementation of odd-even days. The action tries to further control vehicular pollution by restricting the days on which a vehicle may be operated: those with vehicle registrations ending in even numbers one day and those ending with odd numbers on the next day. The scheme was first put into place during what has become the annual air pollution season in 2016.

The air quality index (AQI) was developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as a rating system to alert the public to potentially hazardous air quality. Any measurement above 301 is considered hazardous, and the EPA’s charts only go to 500. Whether New Delhi is suffering from air quality that was 50 times higher than the recommended safe limit as reported by the Associated Press or 39 times higher than recommended levels as reported by Al Jazeera, it is devastatingly high.

When air quality reaches a hazardous rating, the EPA says it can have major health impacts on the lungs and heart, including:

• Premature death in people with heart or lung disease
  
  
• Nonfatal heart attacks
  
  
• Irregular heartbeat
  
  
• Aggravated asthma
  
  
• Decreased lung function
  
  
• Increased respiratory symptoms, such as irritation of the airways, coughing or difficulty breathing.

“People with heart or lung diseases, children, older adults, minority populations, and low socioeconomic status populations are the most likely to be affected by particle pollution exposure, either because they are more sensitive or may have higher exposures,” according to the EPA.

However, when it is as severe as it is in New Delhi, the EPA’s guidance is that “everyone is more likely to be affected.”

Air pollution typically spikes at this time of year in northern India and northern Pakistan for several reasons. Farmers in the Punjab region of Pakistan and the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh burn the rice shoots left over after harvest in the late fall. Atmospheric conditions, particularly cooling temperatures, trap the pollutants in the air, inhibiting their dispersal over the mountains. When combined with human activity in a crowded area—including coal burning power plants, vehicle exhaust, and cooking fires—each year brings a toxic soup to the region’s air. And this year is particularly bad.

“All of North India has been plunged into a medical emergency as stubble burning continues unchecked across the country,” wrote Chief Minister of Delhi Atishi Marlena on X (formerly known as Twitter). “All cities across the country—in UP, Bihar, Rajasthan, Haryana, MP, and Delhi—are reeling under severe levels of pollution. And yet, despite rising severity of stubble burning across India for [the] last five years, the Central Govt. has taken no concrete step to curb the same. All of North India is paying the price for this, especially children and elderly who are struggling to breathe.”

The crop burning will wane and when combined with the restrictions put in place, the air quality is likely to improve. However, as it does every year at this time, the region will likely continue to have an elevated AQI until weather patterns change, typically in January.