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Delhi: Singed by spate of infernos, EDMC lays out rules to avoid landfill fires

The SOPs come as Delhi has seen an increase in landfill fires -- three major fires at Ghazipur landfill and one at Bhalswa landfill over the last two months -- amid heatwave conditions in the city Strict ban on entry of outsiders, including waste pickers; random checks for lighters, matchbox and cigarettes; CCTV cameras; and patrol teams -- these are among the new standard operating procedures (SOP) finalised by the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) to control fires at garbage mounds in its jurisdiction. The SOPs come as Delhi has seen an increase in landfill fires -- three major fires at Ghazipur landfill and one at Bhalswa landfill over the last two months -- amid heatwave conditions in the city. The EDMC controls the Ghazipur landfill. “Landfill fires cause huge air pollution and long-term health impact. Fire incidents are observed more frequently during April-June and October post monsoon. In order to minimise such incidents, the new SOP is being issued for strict compliance,” said the order issued by EDMC engineer-in-chief on May 10. The regulations state that the entry of any unauthorised person shall be completely banned and only machine operators, drivers, transporters and personnel of contractors undertaking biomining will be allowed to enter, and any instances of trespassing will be reported to police. The ban on entry of outsiders will also impact the business of waste pickers who segregate and recycle waste, with the regulations calling for increased vigilance during the vulnerable months when methane generation from decomposing organic waste increases, thereby causing frequent fires. Jai Prakash Chaudhary, secretary of Safai Sena, an organisation of 12,000 waste collectors, said that the civic body should first develop material recovery centres near landfill sites and dhalaos where waste can be segregated. “Waste pickers do not cause fires. We do the work for improving the environment of the city by increasing recycling. MCD can develop material recovery centres where waste pickers can help them in waste segregation while also feeding their families. No one willingly wants to go on top of a landfill,” he added. A senior municipal official said that entry of wastepickers in the landfill was already banned under the previous arrangement and that the latest SOPs only plans to strictly enforce the rule. Spread over an area of 70 acres near Delhi-UP border, the Ghazipur landfill is one of the biggest landfills in the country, holding over eight million tonnes of accumulated legacy waste. It has witnessed four major fire incidents in this year. The new norms also mandate the deployment of water sprinklers on the garbage mound to ensure the moisture content in dry waste is maintained at 5-25%. A reserve of construction and demolition waste will also be developed near vulnerable points for helping in fire fighting operations. A senior municipal official from the department of environment management services (DEMS) said that an inventory of fire extinguishers, emergency lights, hose pipes and jetting machine is also being made available in Ghazipur. “We have already deployed 21 CCTV cameras and more are being added for monitoring the landfill,” the official said. The civic body also plans to install public announcement system, siren system and improve the lighting arrangement along its periphery, state the regulations, a copy of HT has been. Atin Biswas, a waste management expert and programme director of municipal solid waste sector in Centre for Science and Environment, said that segregation of waste should be non-negotiable for a long-term solution to the landfill crisis. “For the time being, the corporations need to carry out compaction of waste to remove air pockets and ensure inert soil layers are formed on daily basis to prevent landfill fires. The fires are not being caused due to 10-20-year-old waste. It is due to fresh waste being dumped.” he added.

Pollution Killed 2.4 Million Indians In 2019: How Did Lancet Calculate This?

Air pollution alone has been attributed to be the cause of some 1.6million deaths in India in 2019. Over 2.3 million people died due to pollution in 2019, a new study by the Lancet indicates. Among these deaths, 1.6 million were caused by air pollution, water pollution caused some 500,000 deaths. The report said that most of the deaths due to air pollution were caused by 'ambient particulate matter pollution and household air pollution'. "The death rate due to household air pollution decreased by 64·2% from 1990 to 2019, while that due to ambient particulate matter pollution increased by 115·3% and that due to ambient ozone pollution increased by 139·2%," the report said. While the Lancet report hints at a worrying picture for India, how did the report conclude that pollution killed 2.3 million people in India in 2019 since there is no protocol for the doctors to write "pollution" as the cause of death on death certificates? The same applies to prescriptions. A person may get allergic reaction due to air pollution, it isn't pronounced as a cause on papers. To understand how the Lancet reached the death numbers, BOOM spoke to experts to know the methodology used in the peer reviewed study. How is pollution estimated to be a cause of death? The numbers are indicative, said Avikal Somvanshi,Senior Programme Manager at Centre for Science and Environment (CSE). This means that there is no direct cause-and-effect conclusion. However, there are a set of diseases which are attributed to pollution, like air pollution for cardiovascular diseases and water pollution for gastric diseases. "The number of deaths caused by such diseases are correlated to the pollution levels in the area," Avikal said. This is a standard method used by health organisations like the World Health Organisation. According to the report, the main sources of 'ambient particulate matter pollution' in India are residential and commercial biomass burning, windblown mineral dust, coal burning for energy generation, industrial emissions, agricultural stubble burning, waste burning, construction activities, brick kilns, transport vehicles, and diesel generators. The Lancet study quotes numbers from 2019, a year before the pandemic began which put a halt on activities like travelling for a while. It was seen during the lockdown in April 2020 how the air quality in different parts of the world improved since the combustion of fuel among other pollution-causing activities had decreased. As such the deaths caused by pollution in the 2020 can be expected to be low in number. "We estimated exposure to ambient particulate matter pollution, household air pollution, and ambient ozone pollution, and their attributable deaths and disability-adjusted life-years in every state of India as part of the Global Burden of Disease Study (GBD) 2019," the Lancet report highlights. Economic impacts of pollution Air pollution has an adverse effect not only on health of the people but also the economy of the country. The report suggests that the burden of death and disease due to air pollution 'could impede India's aspiration to be a $5 trillion economy by 2024.' "Besides endangering health and shortening lifespan, air pollution adversely affects economic productivity," the Lancet report says.

Pollution kills 9 mn people a year; nearly a quarter are from India: Lancet study

About the same number of people die due to air pollution each year as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the Lancet study said A new study blames pollution of all types for 9 million deaths a year globally, with the death toll attributed to dirty air from cars, trucks, and industry rising 55 per cent since 2000. That increase is offset by fewer pollution deaths from primitive indoor stoves and water contaminated with human and animal waste, so overall pollution deaths in 2019 are about the same as in 2015. The United States is the only fully industrialised country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths, ranking 7th with 1,42,883 deaths blamed on pollution in 2019, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Ethiopia, according to a new study in the journal The Lancet Planetary Health. Tuesday’s pre-pandemic study is based on calculations derived from the Global Burden of Disease database and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle. India and China lead the world in pollution deaths with nearly 2.4 million and almost 2.2 million deaths a year, but the two nations also have the world’s largest populations. When deaths are put on a per population rate, the United States ranks 31st from the bottom at 43.6 pollution deaths per 1,00,000. Chad and the Central African Republic ranked the highest with rates about 300 pollution deaths per 1,00,000, more than half of them due to tainted water, while Brunei, Qatar, and Iceland have the lowest pollution death rates ranging from 15 to 23. The global average is 117 pollution deaths per 1,00,000 people. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. “Nine million deaths is a lot of deaths,” said Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College. “The bad news is that it’s not decreasing,” Landrigan said. “We’re making gains in the easy stuff and we’re seeing the more difficult stuff, which is the ambient (outdoor industrial) air pollution and the chemical pollution, still going up.” It doesn’t have to be this way, researchers said. “They are preventable deaths. Each and every one of them is a death that is unnecessary,” said Dr Lynn Goldman, dean of the George Washington University School of Public Health, who wasn’t part of the study. She said the calculations made sense and if anything was so conservative about what it attributed to pollution, the real death toll is likely to be higher. The certificates for these deaths don’t say pollution. They list heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, other lung issues and diabetes that are “tightly correlated” with pollution by numerous epidemiological studies, Landrigan said. Mainstream scientific thought To then put these together with actual deaths, researchers look at the number of deaths by cause, exposure to pollution weighted for various factors, and then complicated exposure-response calculations derived by large epidemiological studies based on thousands of people over decades of study, he said. It’s the same way scientists can say cigarettes cause cancer and heart disease deaths. “That canon of the information constitutes causality,” Landrigan said. “That’s how we do it.” Five outside experts in public health and air pollution, including Goldman, told The Associated Press the study follows mainstream scientific thought. Dr Renee Salas, an emergency room doctor and Harvard professor who wasn’t part of the study, said “the American Heart Association determined over a decade ago that exposure to (tiny pollution particles) like that generated from the burning of fossil fuels is causal for heart disease and death.” “While people focus on decreasing their blood pressure and cholesterol, few recognise that the removal of air pollution is an important prescription to improve their heart health,” Salas said. Three-quarters of the overall pollution deaths came from air pollution and the overwhelming part of that is “a combination of pollution from stationary sources like coal-fired power plants and steel mills on one hand and mobile sources like cars, trucks, and buses. And it’s just a big global problem,” said Landrigan, a public health physician. “And it’s getting worse around the world as countries develop and cities grow.” Source: Lancet In New Delhi, air pollution peaks in the winter months. Last year, the national capital saw just two days when the air wasn’t considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months. “That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing,” said Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it,” Roychowdhury said. Pollution deaths are soaring in the poorest areas, experts said. “This problem is worst in areas of the world where the population is most dense (e.g. Asia) and where financial and government resources to address the pollution problem are limited and stretched thin to address a host of challenges including health care availability and diet as well as pollution,” said Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute, who wasn’t part of the study.

9 million people worldwide are killed by pollution each year, study finds

A new study blames pollution of all types for 9 million deaths a year globally, with the death toll attributed to dirty air from cars, trucks and industry rising 55% since 2000. That increase is offset by fewer pollution deaths from primitive indoor stoves and water contaminated with human and animal waste, so overall pollution deaths in 2019 are about the same as 2015. The United States is the only fully industrialized country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths, ranking 7th with 142,883 deaths blamed on pollution in 2019, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Ethiopia, according to a new study in the journal The Lancet Planetary Health. Tuesday’s pre-pandemic study is based on calculations derived from the Global Burden of Disease database and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle. India and China lead the world in pollution deaths with nearly 2.4 million and almost 2.2 million deaths a year, but the two nations also have the world’s largest populations. When deaths are put on a per population rate, the United States ranks 31st from the bottom at 43.6 pollution deaths per 100,000. Chad and the Central African Republic rank the highest with rates about 300 pollution deaths per 100,000, more than half of them due to tainted water, while Brunei, Qatar and Iceland have the lowest pollution death rates ranging from 15 to 23. The global average is 117 pollution deaths per 100,000 people. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. “9 million deaths is a lot of deaths,” said Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College. “The bad news is that it’s not decreasing,” Landrigan said. “We’re making gains in the easy stuff and we’re seeing the more difficult stuff, which is the ambient (outdoor industrial) air pollution and the chemical pollution, still going up.” It doesn’t have to be this way, researchers said. “They are preventable deaths. Each and every one of them is a death that is unnecessary,” said Dr. Lynn Goldman, dean of the George Washington University School of Public Health, who wasn’t part of the study. She said the calculations made sense and if anything. was so conservative about what it attributed to pollution, that the real death toll is likely higher. The certificates for these deaths don’t say pollution. They list heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, other lung issues and diabetes that are “tightly correlated” with pollution by numerous epidemiological studies, Landrigan said. To then put these together with actual deaths, researchers look at the number of deaths by cause, exposure to pollution weighted for various factors, and then complicated exposure response calculations derived by large epidemiological studies based on thousands of people over decades of study, he said. It’s the same way scientists can say cigarettes cause cancer and heart disease deaths. Three-quarters of the overall pollution deaths came from air pollution, and the overwhelming part of that is “a combination of pollution from stationary sources like coal-fired power plants and steel mills on one hand and mobile sources like cars, trucks and buses. And it’s just a big global problem,” said Landrigan, a public health physician. “And it’s getting worse around the world as countries develop and cities grow.” In New Delhi, India, air pollution peaks in the winter months and last year the city saw just two days when the air wasn’t considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months. That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing, said Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it,” Roychowdhury said. Pollution deaths are soaring in the poorest areas, experts said. “This problem is worst in areas of the world where population is most dense (e.g. Asia) and where financial and government resources to address the pollution problem are limited and stretched thin to address a host of challenges including health care availability and diet as well as pollution,” said Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute, who wasn’t part of the study. In 2000, industrial air pollution killed about 2.9 million people a year globally. By 2015 it was up to 4.2 million and in 2019 it was 4.5 million, the study said. Toss in household air pollution, mostly from inefficient primitive stoves, and air pollution killed 6.7 million people in 2019, the study found. Lead pollution — some from lead additive which has been banned from gasoline in every country in the world and also from old paint, recycling batteries and other manufacturing — kills 900,000 people a year, while water pollution is responsible for 1.4 million deaths a year. Occupational health pollution adds another 870,000 deaths, the study said. In the United States, about 20,000 people a year die from lead pollution-induced hypertension, heart disease and kidney disease, mostly as occupational hazards, Landrigan said. Lead and asbestos are America’s big chemical occupational hazards, and they kill about 65,000 people a year from pollution, he said. The study said the number of air pollution deaths in the United States in 2019 was 60,229, far more than deaths on American roads, which hit a 16-year peak of nearly 43,000 last year. Modern types of pollution are rising in most countries, especially developing ones, but fell from 2000 to 2019 in the United States, the European Union and Ethiopia. Ethiopia’s numbers can’t quite be explained and may be a reporting issue, said study co-author Richard Fuller, founder of the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution and president of Pure Earth, a non-profit that works on pollution clean-up programs in about a dozen countries. The study authors came up with eight recommendations to reduce pollution deaths, highlighting the need for better monitoring, better reporting and stronger government systems regulating industry and cars. “We absolutely know how to solve each one of those problems,” Fuller said. “What’s missing is political will.”

Heatwave in India: सांसों पर भी भारी पड़ रही भीषण गर्मी, हवा में बढ़ती ओजोन से बढ़ रहा खतरा

नई दिल्ली, विवेक तिवारी। अगले कुछ दिन आपको गंभीर वायु प्रदूषण के चलते सांस लेने में दिक्कत हो सकती है। वहीं, रिकॉर्ड गर्मी से हवा में ओजोन की मात्रा बढ़ रही है जो ज्यादा देर धूप में रहने पर आपके लिए घातक साबित हो सकती है। दिल्ली और एनसीआर में हवा में प्रदूषण के स्तर पर नजर रखने वाली पृथ्वी विज्ञान मंत्रालय की संस्था सफर की रिपोर्ट के मुताबिक, अगले तीन दिनों में दिल्ली की हवा में एक बार फिर प्रदूषण का स्तर मानकों से ज्यादा हो जाएगा। हवा में बढ़ती ओजोन की मात्रा आपकी मुश्किल बढ़ा सकती है। सफर की रिपोर्ट के मुताबिक, गुरुवार दोपहर दिल्ली के कई इलाकों में हवा में ओजोन का स्तर मानकों से कहीं अधिक दर्ज किया गया। पूसा में ओजोन का स्तर एयर क्वालिटी इंडेक्स में 258 तक पहुंच गया। जो मानकों से कहीं अधिक है। मानकों के तहत हवा में ओजोन का स्तर एक्यूआई में 100 से ज्यादा नहीं होना चाहिए। इसी तरह दिल्ली स्थित आईआईटी के आसपास के इलाके में ओजोन का स्तर 217 के करीब दर्ज किया गया। नोएडा में यह 197 के करीब रहा। अगले तीन दिन में बढ़ेगा प्रदूषण दिल्ली में पीएम 2.5 का हवा में औसत स्तर 70 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर रहा। अगले तीन दिनों में इसके बढ़ कर 90 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर तक पहुंचने की संभावना है। मानकों के तहत हवा में पीएम 2.5 का स्तर 60 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर से ज्यादा नहीं होना चाहिए। इसी तरह हवा में पीएम 10 का स्तर 227 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर तक दर्ज किया गया। इसके अलगे तीन दिन में बढ़ कर 295 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर के स्तर तक पहुंचने की संभावना है। मानकों के तहत हवा में इसका स्तर 100 माइक्रोग्राम प्रति क्यूबिक मीटर से ज्यादा नहीं होना चाहिए। इस वजह से हवा में बढ़ती है ओजोन सेंटर फॉर साइंस एंड इनवायरमेंट (CSE) की कार्यकारी निदेशक अनुमिता राय चौधरी बताती हैं कि सर्दियों की तुलना में गर्मियों में होने वाला प्रदूषण काफी अलग होता है। कई अध्ययनों में पाया गया है कि गर्मी में दर्ज किए जाने वाले प्रदूषण में धूल के कण ज्यादा होते हैं। सर्दियों में होने वाले प्रदूषण में धूल की मात्रा 15 फीसदी तक होती है वहीं गर्मियों में ये मात्रा बढ़ कर 30 फीसदी तक हो जाती है। अनुमिता कहती हैं कि हमें ध्यान रखना होगा कि हवा में बढ़ता ओजोन का स्तर बेहद खतरनाक है। ओजोन के प्रदूषण का कोई खास सोर्स नहीं होता है। बेहद गर्म मौसम में गाड़ियों और पावर प्लांट से निकलने वाला धुआं आपस में क्रिया करके ओजोन बनाने लगता और हवा में ओजोन का स्तर बढ़ने लगता है। प्रदूषण पर कैसे लगेगी लगाम अनुमिता रॉय चौधरी के मुताबिक अरावली और रिज इलाकों में पेड़ों की संख्या बढ़ाने के साथ ही हमें दिल्ली और एनसीआर के चारों ओर एक पेड़ों की एक ग्रीन वॉल बनानी होगी। पेड़ पौधे धूल भरी आंधियों के प्रभाव को काफी कम कम कर देते हैं। वहीं शहर में गाड़ियों की संख्या घटाने और सड़कों और फुटपाथ को बेहतर बनाने भी प्रदूषण कम होगा। सड़कें टूटी होने पर धूल ज्यादा उड़ती है। हवा में बढ़ती ओजोन है खतरनाक दिल्ली मेडिकल काउंसिल की साइंटिफिक कमेटी के चेयरमैन डॉक्टर नरेंद्र सैनी के मुताबिक हवा में ओजोन के स्तर का बढ़ना काफी खतरनाक है। ये सीधे हमारे फेफड़ों पर असर डालता है। हवा में ओजोन बढ़ने से सांस लेते समय छाती में दर्द, खांसी, गले में जलन और सांस की नली में सूजन जैसी दिक्कत हो सकती है। फेफड़ों के काम करने में कमी आ सकती है। ओजोन ब्रोंकाइटिस, अस्थमा इत्यादि को और खराब कर सकता है। ओजोन के कारण कार्डियोवैस्कुलर बिमारी हो सकती है जो कि दिल को प्रभावित कर सकती है। बहुत लम्बे समय तक ओजोन के सांस के जरिए शरीर में जाने से कैंसर जैसी बीमारियों का खतरा भी हो सकता है।

Tips: AC को 16-18 डिग्री पर चलाना पड़ेगा जेब पर भारी, इतना रखेंगे टेंपरेचर तो बिल और गर्मी दोनों होंगे कम

इन दिनों राजधानी में रेकॉर्ड गर्मी पड़ रही है। इससे बचने के लिए लोग AC का प्रयोग कर रहे हैं और दिल्ली सरकार की जीरो बिल की स्कीम का लाभ नहीं ले पा रहे हैं। वहीं AC बाहर के वातावरण को और अधिक गर्म भी कर रहे हैं। बीएसईएस से मिली जानकारी के अनुसार 12 मई को राजधानी में बिजली की डिमांड 6780 मेगावॉट तक पहुंच गई। यह 24 घंटे में ही 2.8 प्रतिशत तक बढ़ गई। बीएसईएस के अनुसार इसकी मुख्य वजह AC ही हैं। 50 प्रतिशत बिजली की खपत AC, पंखों और कूलर की वजह से हो रही है। CSI की 2019 की एक रिपोर्ट में दावा किया गया है कि गर्मी की वजह से दिल्ली में लोगों को सात महीने AC चलाना पड़ता है। यदि इसी हिसाब से AC चलते रहे तो एक दशक में बिजली की डिमांड दोगुनी हो सकती है। इसी रिपोर्ट में यह भी कहा गया है कि राजधानी के लोग सबसे अधिक बिजली रात में 12 से 1 बजे के बीच खर्च करते हैं। जबकि इसके बाद दोपहर 3 से 4 बजे के बीच पावर की डिमांड रही है। CSI की अनुमिता राय चौधरी के अनुसार AC चलाने से बिल्डिंग तो ठंडी हो रही है लेकिन बाहर गर्मी बढ़ रही है। इसकी वजह से गलियों में रहने वाले लोगों की मुश्किलें बढ़ रही हैं। इनके अनुसार गर्मियों में घरों को ठंडा रखने के उपकरणों की वजह से बिजली की डिमांड में सबसे अधिक वृद्धि हुई है। 1.5 टन के AC को चलाने के लिए दिल्ली वालों का बिल करीब 5000 रुपये मासिक के करीब आ रहा है। जबकि दिल्ली में देश की सबसे सस्ती बिजली उपलब्ध है। एनर्जी कनजर्वेशन एक्सपर्ट सुनील विश्वास के अनुसार 3 स्टार स्पिल्ट AC एक दिन में 6 घंटे चलता है तो 30 दिन में 260 किलोवॉट बिजली की खपत होती है।

Global pollution kills 9 million people a year, study finds

A new study blames pollution of all types for 9 million deaths a year globally, with the death toll attributed to dirty air from cars, trucks and industry rising 55 percent since 2000. That increase is offset by fewer pollution deaths from primitive indoor stoves and water contaminated with human and animal waste, so overall pollution deaths in 2019 are about the same as 2015. The United States is the only fully industrialized country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths, ranking 7th with 142,883 deaths blamed on pollution in 2019, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Ethiopia, according to a new study in the journal The Lancet Planetary Health. Tuesday’s pre-pandemic study is based on calculations derived from the Global Burden of Disease database and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle. India and China lead the world in pollution deaths with nearly 2.4 million and almost 2.2 million deaths a year, but the two nations also have the world’s largest populations. When deaths are put on a per population rate, the United States ranks 31st from the bottom at 43.6 pollution deaths per 100,000. Chad and the Central African Republic rank the highest with rates about 300 pollution deaths per 100,000, more than half of them due to tainted water, while Brunei, Qatar and Iceland have the lowest pollution death rates ranging from 15 to 23. The global average is 117 pollution deaths per 100,000 people. A smog-covered downtown area of Yuncheng city, Shanxi Province, Nov 25, 2021. Pollution of all types is responsible for 9 million deaths a year globally, a new study says. Barcroft Media via Getty Images Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. “Nine million deaths is a lot of deaths,” said Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College. “The bad news is that it’s not decreasing,” Landrigan said. “We’re making gains in the easy stuff and we’re seeing the more difficult stuff, which is the ambient (outdoor industrial) air pollution and the chemical pollution, still going up.” It doesn’t have to be this way, researchers said. “They are preventable deaths. Each and every one of them is a death that is unnecessary,” said Dr. Lynn Goldman, dean of the George Washington University School of Public Health, who wasn’t part of the study. She said the calculations made sense and if anything. was so conservative about what it attributed to pollution, that the real death toll is likely higher. Fishermen catch fish in Megna river smoggy conditions in Narayanganj on January 21, 2022. Modern types of pollution are rising in most countries, especially developing ones. AFP via Getty Images The certificates for these deaths don’t say pollution. They list heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, other lung issues and diabetes that are “tightly correlated” with pollution by numerous epidemiological studies, Landrigan said. To then put these together with actual deaths, researchers look at the number of deaths by cause, exposure to pollution weighted for various factors, and then complicated exposure response calculations derived by large epidemiological studies based on thousands of people over decades of study, he said. It’s the same way scientists can say cigarettes cause cancer and heart disease deaths. “That cannon of information constitutes causality,” Landrigan said. “That’s how we do it.” Five outside experts in public health and air pollution, including Goldman, told The Associated Press the study follows mainstream scientific thought. Dr. Renee Salas, an emergency room doctor and Harvard professor who wasn’t part of the study, said “the American Heart Association determined over a decade ago that exposure to (tiny pollution particles) like that generated from the burning of fossil fuels is causal for heart disease and death.” “While people focus on decreasing their blood pressure and cholesterol, few recognize that the removal of air pollution is an important prescription to improve their heart health,” Salas said. Three-quarters of the overall pollution deaths came from air pollution and the overwhelming part of that is “a combination of pollution from stationary sources like coal-fired power plants and steel mills on one hand and mobile sources like cars, trucks and buses. And it’s just a big global problem,” said Landrigan, a public health physician. “And it’s getting worse around the world as countries develop and cities grow.” This general view shows the Musalla Minarets Complex amid smog conditions in Herat on February 14, 2022. The United States is the only fully industrialized country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths. AFP via Getty Images In New Delhi, India, air pollution peaks in the winter months and last year the city saw just two days when the air wasn’t considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months. That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing, said Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it,” Roychowdhury said. Pollution deaths are soaring in the poorest areas, experts said. “This problem is worst in areas of the world where population is most dense (e.g. Asia) and where financial and government resources to address the pollution problem are limited and stretched thin to address a host of challenges including health care availability and diet as well as pollution,” said Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute, who wasn’t part of the study. Heavy smog seen in area surrounding Ghazipur landfill in morning after fire continues on the second day since Monday afternoon on March 29, 2022 in New Delhi, India. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. Hindustan Times via Getty Images In 2000, industrial air pollution killed about 2.9 million people a year globally. By 2015 it was up to 4.2 million and in 2019 it was 4.5 million, the study said. Toss in household air pollution, mostly from inefficient primitive stoves, and air pollution killed 6.7 million people in 2019, the study found. Lead pollution — some from lead additive which has been banned from gasoline in every country in the world and also from old paint, recycling batteries and other manufacturing — kills 900,000 people a year, while water pollution is responsible for 1.4 million deaths a year. Occupational health pollution adds another 870,000 deaths, the study said. Keep up with today's most important news Stay up on the very latest with Evening Update. Enter your email address By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. In the United States, about 20,000 people a year die from lead pollution-induced hypertension, heart disease and kidney disease, mostly as occupational hazards, Landrigan said. Lead and asbestos are America’s big chemical occupational hazards, and they kill about 65,000 people a year from pollution, he said. The study said the number of air pollution deaths in the United States in 2019 was 60,229, far more than deaths on American roads, which hit a 16-year peak of nearly 43,000 last year. Modern types of pollution are rising in most countries, especially developing ones, but fell from 2000 to 2019 in the United States, the European Union and Ethiopia. Ethiopia’s numbers can’t quite be explained and may be a reporting issue, said study co-author Richard Fuller, founder of the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution and president of Pure Earth, a non-profit that works on pollution clean-up programs in about a dozen countries. The study authors came up with eight recommendations to reduce pollution deaths, highlighting the need for better monitoring, better reporting and stronger government systems regulating industry and cars. “We absolutely know how to solve each one of those problems,” Fuller said. “What’s missing is political will.”

Pollution kills nearly 24 lakh people in India in a year: Study

A study has claimed that pollution killed 24 lakh people in India in a year. The study in the journal The Lancet Planetary Health blamed pollution of all types for 90 lakh deaths a year globally while the deaths due to dirty air from automobiles and industries have been rising 55% since 2000. Air pollution from industry processes along with urbanization drove a 7% increase in pollution-related deaths from 2015 to 2019, according to the scientists’ analysis of data on global mortality and pollution levels. The US is the only fully industrialised country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths, ranking 7th with 142,883 deaths blamed on pollution in 2019, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Ethiopia. The world's most populated country China reported almost 22 lakh deaths a year because of pollution. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. According to Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College, the death certificates don't mention pollution as the reason, heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, other lung issues, and diabetes that are “tightly correlated" with pollution are mentioned. In New Delhi, India, air pollution peaks in the winter months, and last year the city saw just two days when the air wasn't considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months. That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing, said Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it," Roychowdhury said.

WATCH - India’s pollution deaths highest in 2019: 'Modern type of pollution is highly toxic', says Vivek Chattopadhyay

Clean Air campaign: The problem of pollution in India has reached its crescendo with the highest number of deaths being reported in the country. It is an issue that has to be discussed and actioned urgently and the Clean Air Campaign aims to find out the causes of the issue and possible solutions. New Delhi: India's pollution situation has crossed a critical point with a Lancet study concluding that India has the highest number of deaths due to pollution. The issue at hand is of utmost urgency and Mirror Now spoke to Vivek Chattopadhyay, Senior program manager, Clean Air campaign, from The Centre for Science and Environment to discuss the causes and find solutions to the problem. Chattopadhyay said, “The worrisome figures are due to the fact that our actions are far behind from what is expected to reduce the health application. Many children and elder people are developing health issues and it's not just the figure of deaths that is a worry but also the other health issues that arise from the rise in pollution. The modern type of pollution is highly toxic.” He further went on to add that the seriousness to tackle the issue seems to be missing. “We are falling far behind in what should be done to reduce pollution. We are not able to deal with the toxic and chemical pollution that is happening. The real solution lies in working on the ground. There has to be continuous monitoring of what is happening on the ground and if our actions to combat the menace are working.” While some argue that the death rate is lower in India owing to the large population, the point lies in why anyone should die due to pollution. "If we go by the focus that each life matters, then only will we be able to tackle the pollution problem. Many times, the problem is not even reported as people don't connect their health problem with pollution but other factors that might not actually have a nearing on the situation," Chattopadhyay asserted.

Explained: How pollution continues to be a giant killer in India

Pollution was responsible for 22 lakh deaths in India in 2019, according to a recent study. The death toll because of air pollution stood at 16.7 lakh, the most in any country Pollution killed 22 lakh people in India in a year. Air pollution was responsible for 16.7 lakh deaths in the country in 2019, according to a recent report on pollution and health published in The Lancet Planetary Health, the largest in any country. Ninety lakh people died across the world because of all types of pollution with the toll attributed to dirty air from cars, trucks, and industry rising 55 per cent since 2000. China remains the most polluted country with 24 lakhs death, India is a close second. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, according to the study. “9 million deaths is a lot of deaths,” said Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College. India’s pollution problems The report says that the amount of pollution in India remains well above the World Health Organisation guidelines in 93 per cent of the country. Of the 16.7 lakh air pollution-related deaths in the country, 9.8 lakh were caused by PM2.5 pollution, and another 6.1 lakh by household air pollution. The number of deaths from indoor air pollution and water pollution has decreased. However, these reductions are offset by increased deaths attributable to industrial pollution such as ambient air pollution and chemical pollution, the report pointed out. Air pollution is responsible for 17.8 per cent of all deaths in the country. The polluted spaces Air pollution is the most severe in the Indo-Gangetic Plain, which contains Delhi and some of the world’s most polluted cities. In New Delhi, air pollution peaks in the winter months and last year the city saw just two days when the air wasn’t considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months, says The Associated Press, quoting the Lancet report. Burning of biomass in households was the single-largest cause of air pollution deaths in India, followed by coal combustion and crop burning, according to the report. Explained How pollution continues to be a giant killer in India Crop burning is one of the leading causes of air pollution in the country. AFP Government efforts The number of deaths remained high despite efforts by the government to control household air pollution including the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, an initiative launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May 2016 to distribute LPG connections to below-poverty-line households. India has developed a National Clean Air Programme and in 2019 launched a Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region. However, India does not have a strong centralised administrative system to drive its air pollution control efforts and consequently improvements in overall air quality have been limited and uneven, the report has said, according to The Indian Express. It’s a South Asia problem That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing, Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi, told AP. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it,” Roychowdhury said. Pollution deaths are soaring in the poorest areas, experts said. Explained How pollution continues to be a giant killer in India Pollution killed 90 lakh people globally in 2019. AFP Pollution and economic losses Economic losses due to modern forms of pollution have increased have proportion of GDP between 2000 and 2019 in India, China, and Nigeria, and are now conservatively estimated to amount to approximately 1% of the GDP in each of these countries. The full economic losses, if the full health impacts of pollution were to be counted and the effects of pollution on informal sectors and environmental damage were to be fully detailed are likely to be greater, the study said.

Global pollution kills 9 million people a year, study finds

A new study blames pollution of all types for 9 million deaths a year globally, with the death toll attributed to dirty air from cars, trucks and industry rising 55% since 2000. That increase is offset by fewer pollution deaths from primitive indoor stoves and water contaminated with human and animal waste, so overall pollution deaths in 2019 are about the same as 2015. The United States is the only fully industrialized country in the top 10 nations for total pollution deaths, ranking 7th with 142,883 deaths blamed on pollution in 2019, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Ethiopia, according to a new study in the journal The Lancet Planetary Health. Tuesday’s pre-pandemic study is based on calculations derived from the Global Burden of Disease database and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle. India and China lead the world in pollution deaths with nearly 2.4 million and almost 2.2 million deaths a year, but the two nations also have the world’s largest populations. When deaths are put on a per population rate, the United States ranks 31st from the bottom at 43.6 pollution deaths per 100,000. Chad and the Central African Republic rank the highest with rates about 300 pollution deaths per 100,000, more than half of them due to tainted water, while Brunei, Qatar and Iceland have the lowest pollution death rates ranging from 15 to 23. The global average is 117 pollution deaths per 100,000 people. Pollution kills about the same number of people a year around the world as cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke combined, the study said. “9 million deaths is a lot of deaths,” said Philip Landrigan, director of the Global Public Health Program and Global Pollution Observatory at Boston College. “The bad news is that it’s not decreasing,” Landrigan said. “We’re making gains in the easy stuff and we’re seeing the more difficult stuff, which is the ambient (outdoor industrial) air pollution and the chemical pollution, still going up.” It doesn’t have to be this way, researchers said. “They are preventable deaths. Each and every one of them is a death that is unnecessary,” said Dr. Lynn Goldman, dean of the George Washington University School of Public Health, who wasn’t part of the study. She said the calculations made sense and if anything. was so conservative about what it attributed to pollution, that the real death toll is likely higher. The certificates for these deaths don’t say pollution. They list heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, other lung issues and diabetes that are “tightly correlated” with pollution by numerous epidemiological studies, Landrigan said. To then put these together with actual deaths, researchers look at the number of deaths by cause, exposure to pollution weighted for various factors, and then complicated exposure response calculations derived by large epidemiological studies based on thousands of people over decades of study, he said. It’s the same way scientists can say cigarettes cause cancer and heart disease deaths. “That cannon of information constitutes causality,” Landrigan said. “That’s how we do it.” Five outside experts in public health and air pollution, including Goldman, told The Associated Press the study follows mainstream scientific thought. Dr. Renee Salas, an emergency room doctor and Harvard professor who wasn’t part of the study, said “the American Heart Association determined over a decade ago that exposure to (tiny pollution particles) like that generated from the burning of fossil fuels is causal for heart disease and death.” “While people focus on decreasing their blood pressure and cholesterol, few recognize that the removal of air pollution is an important prescription to improve their heart health,” Salas said. Three-quarters of the overall pollution deaths came from air pollution and the overwhelming part of that is “a combination of pollution from stationary sources like coal-fired power plants and steel mills on one hand and mobile sources like cars, trucks and buses. And it’s just a big global problem,” said Landrigan, a public health physician. “And it’s getting worse around the world as countries develop and cities grow.” In New Delhi, India, air pollution peaks in the winter months and last year the city saw just two days when the air wasn’t considered polluted. It was the first time in four years that the city experienced a clean air day during the winter months. That air pollution remains the leading cause of death in South Asia reconfirms what is already known, but the increase in these deaths means that toxic emissions from vehicles and energy generation is increasing, said Anumita Roychowdhury, a director at the advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi. “This data is a reminder of what is going wrong but also that it is an opportunity to fix it,” Roychowdhury said. Pollution deaths are soaring in the poorest areas, experts said. “This problem is worst in areas of the world where population is most dense (e.g. Asia) and where financial and government resources to address the pollution problem are limited and stretched thin to address a host of challenges including health care availability and diet as well as pollution,” said Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute, who wasn’t part of the study. In 2000, industrial air pollution killed about 2.9 million people a year globally. By 2015 it was up to 4.2 million and in 2019 it was 4.5 million, the study said. Toss in household air pollution, mostly from inefficient primitive stoves, and air pollution killed 6.7 million people in 2019, the study found. Lead pollution — some from lead additive which has been banned from gasoline in every country in the world and also from old paint, recycling batteries and other manufacturing — kills 900,000 people a year, while water pollution is responsible for 1.4 million deaths a year. Occupational health pollution adds another 870,000 deaths, the study said. In the United States, about 20,000 people a year die from lead pollution-induced hypertension, heart disease and kidney disease, mostly as occupational hazards, Landrigan said. Lead and asbestos are America’s big chemical occupational hazards, and they kill about 65,000 people a year from pollution, he said. The study said the number of air pollution deaths in the United States in 2019 was 60,229, far more than deaths on American roads, which hit a 16-year peak of nearly 43,000 last year. Modern types of pollution are rising in most countries, especially developing ones, but fell from 2000 to 2019 in the United States, the European Union and Ethiopia. Ethiopia’s numbers can’t quite be explained and may be a reporting issue, said study co-author Richard Fuller, founder of the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution and president of Pure Earth, a non-profit that works on pollution clean-up programs in about a dozen countries. The study authors came up with eight recommendations to reduce pollution deaths, highlighting the need for better monitoring, better reporting and stronger government systems regulating industry and cars. “We absolutely know how to solve each one of those problems,” Fuller said. “What’s missing is political will.”

प्रदूषण से हर साल जाती है 90 लाख लोगों की जान, भारत और चीन में सबसे ज्यादा मौतें

वायु प्रदूषण से बड़े शहर ज्यादा परेशान हैं. हर तरह के वाहन, उद्योग, सब प्रदूषण बढ़ाने में योदगान देते हैं. शहर जैसे-जैसे विकसित होते हैं, प्रदूषण भी व... https://www.aajtak.in/science/photo/global-pollution-kills-9-million-people-every-year-india-and-china-on-top-tstr-1465854-2022-05-18-9

रिसर्च में किया गया बड़ा दावा, भारत में प्रदूषण से एक साल में करीब 24 लाख लोगों की मौत

एक अध्ययन में दावा किया गया है कि प्रदूषण ने भारत में एक साल में 24 लाख लोगों की जान ले ली। द लैंसेट प्लैनेटरी हेल्थ जर्नल में अध्ययन ने वैश्विक स्तर पर हर साल 90 लाख मौतों के लिए सभी प्रकार के प्रदूषण को जिम्मेदार ठहराया, जबकि ऑटोमोबाइल और उद्योगों से गंदी हवा के कारण होने वाली मौतों में 2000 से 55% की वृद्धि हुई है। शहरीकरण के साथ-साथ उद्योग प्रक्रियाओं से वायु प्रदूषण ने एक वैश्विक मृत्यु दर और प्रदूषण के स्तर पर वैज्ञानिकों के आंकड़ों के विश्लेषण के अनुसार, 2015 से 2019 तक प्रदूषण से संबंधित मौतों में 7% की वृद्धि हुई है। कुल प्रदूषण से होने वाली मौतों के लिए शीर्ष 10 देशों में अमेरिका एकमात्र पूरी तरह से औद्योगिक देश है। दुनिया के सबसे अधिक आबादी वाले देश चीन में प्रदूषण के कारण हर साल लगभग 22 लाख मौतें होती हैं। अध्ययन में कहा गया है कि प्रदूषण से दुनिया भर में एक साल में उतनी ही संख्या में लोगों की मौत होती है, जितनी सिगरेट पीने और सेकेंड हैंड धुएं को मिलाकर होती है। बोस्टन कॉलेज में ग्लोबल पब्लिक हेल्थ प्रोग्राम और ग्लोबल पॉल्यूशन ऑब्जर्वेटरी के निदेशक फिलिप लैंड्रिगन के अनुसार, मृत्यु प्रमाण पत्र में प्रदूषण का कारण के रूप में उल्लेख नहीं है, हृदय रोग, स्ट्रोक, फेफड़ों का कैंसर, फेफड़ों के अन्य मुद्दों और मधुमेह (जो प्रदूषण के साथ "सहसंबद्ध" हैं) का उल्लेख किया गया है। नई दिल्ली, भारत में, वायु प्रदूषण सर्दियों के महीनों में चरम पर होता है और पिछले साल शहर में केवल दो दिन देखे, जब हवा को प्रदूषित नहीं माना गया था। चार वर्षों में यह पहली बार था, जब शहर ने सर्दियों के महीनों के दौरान स्वच्छ हवा का अनुभव किया। सेंटर फॉर साइंस एंड की एक निदेशक अनुमिता रॉयचौधरी ने कहा कि वायु प्रदूषण दक्षिण एशिया में मृत्यु का प्रमुख कारण बना हुआ है, जो पहले से ही ज्ञात की पुष्टि करता है, लेकिन इन मौतों में वृद्धि का मतलब है कि वाहनों से विषाक्त उत्सर्जन और ऊर्जा उत्पादन बढ़ रहा है। रॉयचौधरी ने कहा, "यह डेटा गलत होने की याद दिलाता है, लेकिन यह भी है कि यह इसे ठीक करने का एक अवसर है।"

Delhi: 3 weeks after fire, smouldering Bhalswa landfill casts a dark shadow on area

NEW DELHI: The flames may be out, but smoke continues to rise from the mound of garbage at Bhalswa landfill in north Delhi three weeks after a fire broke out there. Civic officials claimed that the smoke was due to the smouldering in the heaps of garbage being dumped every day, not in the legacy waste. “A major concern is that when the landfill smoulders for a long time, toxic emissions increase. When Bhalswa landfill caught fire, the impact of the combustion on air quality was reflected in the readings from the nearby monitoring stations,” said Anumita Roy Chowdhury, executive director, Centre for Science and Environment. “Also, since it is a dumpsite with mixed waste, the smouldering remains of a fire has a far more adverse effect on the health of local communities.” Timesview The fire at the landfill site has become a serious health-hazard for those living in nearby areas, especially in a city already ravaged by pollution. One shudders to think about the effect of the poisonous fumes on their bodies in the past three weeks. Authorities should try their best to put out the fire as quickly as possible. In fact, the air quality in the region, which has localities like Burari, Jahangirpuri, Rohini, Bawana and Alipur, has been mostly in the very poor category all these days. According to the officials, 5-6 acres of the 70-acre landfill is covered in smoke due to the daily dumping of unsegregated urban waste and the subsequent formation of methane gas. “The areas under the north corporation generate 4,500 tonnes of waste, around 50% of which reaches Bhalswa with the rest sent to the Narela-Bawana landfill for processing. The 2,230 tonnes dumped at Bhalswa is mostly wet and forms methane which catches fire at high temperatures,” claimed V K Gupta, director-in-chief, Bhalswa landfill. The waste sent to the Narela landfill — the only engineered sanitary facility in the city – is converted into compost or used in power generation. Officials claimed that they have been trying to extinguish the fire fully using the internal water sprinklers. The landfill caught fire on April 26, but despite all the efforts since then, a part of the landfill has continued to smoulder and the smoke is affecting the region's air quality. In April, Delhi environment minister Gopal Rai has advised officials to replicate the gas sucking system installed in the landfill in Mumbai to prevent fires. However, Gupta said, “A few years ago we explored this technique but the National Green Tribunal denied its installation. The aim is to treat the entire mountain of garbage, so we are developing a scientific facility that will process the municipal waste. Once that facility is ready, we will finish the work on the legacy waste at Bhalswa and clear the landfill by 2024.” Gupta said so far 24 lakh tonnes of the 80 lakh tonnes of legacy waste had been processed. Inert waste constituted 50% of the treated material, municipal solid waste accounted for 30% and the rest was construction waste.

India's susceptibility to climate crises on display with heatwave

Experts in India have raised alarm over the susceptibility of the country to environmental issues as millions of Indians are struggling to cope with a record-shattering, scorching heatwave sweeping across the country with even birds dropping every day exhausted and dehydrated. India is currently witnessing an intense heatwave, with the India Meteorological Department saying that the country has recorded its warmest March in 122 years. Speaking to Anadolu Agency (AA), Mohammad Farooq Azam, who studies glaciers at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, said the ongoing heatwave in India and other South Asian countries is an example of climate change. "The last March and April months have been the hottest over the century and ongoing May is expected to be hotter by 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) than the average temperature in May," he said, adding that heatwaves cause severe damage to our society and other ecosystems. Avantika Goswami, program manager at the Centre for Science and Environment, a leading New Delhi-based environmental think-tank, said India is losing around 101 billion work hours per year due to extreme heat. "This will rise as global temperatures rise further. Our agricultural yield is already being affected by climate change, and so are the threats from sea level rise and extreme rainfall,” she said. Stating that the frequency and strength of such heatwaves are expected to increase in India due to climate change, Azam said as climate change is a global phenomenon, its solution must be at a global level with the active participation of all nations. "A sharp curbing of black carbon emissions at local as well as the global scale is needed to limit/reverse the imminent climate-change-related catastrophes," he said. While India is addressing the climate change issue by increasing dependency on renewable sources of energy, especially solar energy, Azam believes that there is a need to have more dedicated climate change research centers at the premier institutions in the country. Goswami said while India is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change, it has "emitted only 3% of carbon dioxide emissions since 1870, making us a very small contributor to the climate crisis." She called for a plan to address coal dependence and goals need stronger implementation domestically. "We have fairly ambitious climate goals at the moment, focused mostly on decarbonizing our energy sector," she said. Suman Mor, chairperson at the Department of Environment Studies, in North India, based at Panjab University, said that climate models predict that India's climate will change quickly, which will put more stress on the country's natural ecosystems, agricultural output, and freshwater resources. She has recently completed a research project titled Improving adaptation strategies for climate extremes and air pollution affecting India. "If mitigation and adaptation steps are not taken quickly, wisely, and on a large scale, the effects of climate change are likely to make it very hard for the country to keep up its fast economic growth and reach the sustainable development goals (SDGs) that U.N. member states agreed to in 2015," she told AA. The Indian government, on the other hand, is maintaining that it is implementing the National Action Plan on Climate Change, which is the overarching policy framework for climate action in India. "Several other measures are taken, keeping in view the threat of climate change, by various departments, ministries, and entities of the Government, as part of their regular mandated activities and responsibilities. These are periodically shared with all stakeholders and the world through India’s National Communications and Biennial Update Reports submitted to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change," the government said in parliament last month.

No option’: Poor workers struggle amid India’s brutal heatwave

For construction worker Yogendra Tundre, life at a building site in Noida, a satellite city of the Indian capital New Delhi is hard enough. This year, record high temperatures are making it unbearable. As India grapples with an unprecedented heatwave, the country’s vast majority of poor workers, who generally work outdoors, are vulnerable to the scorching temperatures. “There is too much heat and if we won’t work, what will we eat? For a few days, we work and then we sit idle for a few days because of tiredness and heat,” Tundre said. Temperatures in the New Delhi area have touched 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit) this year, often causing Tundre, and his wife Lata, who works at the same construction site, to fall sick. That in turn means they lose income. “Because of heat, sometimes I don’t go to work. I take days off… many times, fall sick from dehydration and then require glucose bottles (intravenous fluids),” Lata said while standing outside their house, a temporary shanty with a tin roof. Labourers work at a construction site on a hot summer day in Noida, India [Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters] Scientists have linked the early onset of an intense summer to climate change, and say more than a billion people in India and neighbouring Pakistan are in some way at risk from the extreme heat. India suffered its hottest March in more than 100 years and parts of the country experienced their highest temperatures on record in April. Many places, including New Delhi, saw the temperature gauge climb past 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit). More than two dozen people have died of suspected heat strokes since late March, and power demand has hit multi-year highs. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called on state governments to draw up measures to mitigate the impact of the extreme heat Tundre and Lata live with their two young children in a slum near the construction site in Noida. They moved from their home state of Chhattisgarh in central India to seek work and higher wages around the capital. On the construction site, labourers scale the walls, lay concrete and carry heavy loads, with only ragged scarves around their heads as protection against the sun. But even when the couple finishes their day’s work, they have little respite as they return to their hot home, which has absorbed the heat of the sun all day long. Avikal Somvanshi, an urban environment researcher from India’s Centre for Science and Environment, said federal government data showed that heat stress was the most common cause of death, after lightning, from forces of nature in the last 20 years. “Most of these deaths occur in men aged 30 to 45. These are working-class, blue-collar men who have no option but to be working in the scorching heat,” Somvanshi said. There are no laws in India that prevent outdoor activity when temperatures surpass a certain level, unlike in some Middle-Eastern countries, Somvanshi said