Delhi: The good and the bad, according to CPCB

NEW DELHI: The city has recorded only three good air quality days - defined conventionally as days with AQI of 50 or below - in 2022 against only one such day in 2021 and five in 2020, according to Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) data. The city, going by this data, saw a total of 163 good, moderate and satisfactory days in 2022.
"By good air days, the minister meant a combination of days with good, satisfactory and moderate air quality.It's consolidated data coming from the network of monitoring stations, both from CPCB as well as Delhi Pollution Control Committee. Some of the older data is attributed to CPCB alone due to unavailability of DPCC monitoring stations before 2018. Over time, more stations were added to the list," explained a Delhi government official.
Track the pollution level in your city
According to a report by Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM), too, the average AQI of Delhi was very good. "The average daily AQI for Delhi during the entire 2022 has been the best so far since 2015, barring 2020 which saw an exceptional AQI owing to continued spells of lockdown and low anthropogenic activities round the year," a CAQM report published in January this year had stated.
"It is true that in the long-term trend, the air quality of the city has indeed improved. All the assessments so far have shown that year on year, air quality has improved. However, the pollution levels are still very high and more than 60% higher than the national standards. So, there is a need to take drastic steps to control pollution," said Anumita Roychowdhury, Centre for Science and Environment's executive director (research and advocacy).
According to an assessment by CSE, based on CPCB's real-time data, as of 2022, the annual average PM2.5 - major source of pollution - was 101 micrograms per cubic metre against 108 micrograms per cubic metre in 2021; 96 in 2020 and 109 in 2019. The national annual standard is 40 while the international standard set by WHO is 5.