CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, Delhi Zonal Centre, New Delhi 110028, India; Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR), Ghaziabad 201002, Uttar Pradesh, India.
CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, Delhi Zonal Centre, New Delhi 110028, India.
Sci Total Environ. 2021 Dec 1;798:149143. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.149143. Epub 2021 Jul 30.
Critical assessment of spatio-temporal variations in pollution levels is a crucial step for identifying and prioritizing air pollution hotspots (APH) in urban areas. There is no universally accepted methodology for defining and delineating air pollution hotspot which can be source-specific, pollutant-specific and time-specific. The present research article is an attempt to develop a protocol for identifying APH for any pollutant within a city where-in three criteria-based innovative methodology has been derived. The three criteria are frequency of exceedance (% of days), scale of exceedance and consistency in exceedance (consecutive number of days) to the specified standards that need to be met continuously for at least three years. The suggested methodology has been applied on a three-year database (2018-2021) of 37 continuous ambient air quality stations to identify PM specific APH. The analysis indicates 11 APH in April, 9 in May, 2 in June and almost the entire city during the October-February months. Given prioritization of implementation of control actions, the identified APH during summer has been further physically examined to map source activity types and their suitability for ambient air quality monitoring stations as per the guidelines. The APH can be the priority areas for the implementation of control actions by urban local bodies. The management of air pollution at these priority areas would be more effective instead of city-scale management practice, which is difficult to implement and monitor.
对污染水平的时空变化进行批判性评估是识别和确定城市空气污染热点（APH）的关键步骤。目前尚无普遍接受的定义和划定空气污染热点的方法，这些热点可能因来源、污染物和时间而异。本研究文章旨在为城市内任何污染物确定 APH 制定一个方案，其中提出了三种基于标准的创新方法。这三个标准是超标频率（超标天数的百分比）、超标规模和超标一致性（连续超标天数），需要连续至少三年达到指定标准。建议的方法已应用于三年（2018-2021 年）的 37 个连续环境空气质量站的数据库，以确定特定 PM 的 APH。分析表明，4 月有 11 个 APH，5 月有 9 个，6 月有 2 个，10 月至 2 月几乎整个城市都是 APH。考虑到优先实施控制措施，对夏季确定的 APH 进行了进一步的实地检查，以根据指南绘制源活动类型及其对环境空气质量监测站的适用性。APH 可以成为城市地方机构实施控制措施的优先领域。在这些优先领域管理空气污染将比城市规模的管理实践更有效，因为后者难以实施和监测。
