Mumbai: For better monitoring of air quality in the city, four more mobile air quality monitoring vans will be procured by BMC. Currently, it has one such mobile van. The four additional vans will be deployed at various pollution hotspots. These mobile air quality monitoring vans will be tailor-made for the civic body and will be procured at a cost of Rs 5 crore.
Tenders to procure the vans will be floated soon. “Whenever we receive pollution-related complaints, we will be able to deploy these vans at those spots. We will also be able to measure category-wise pollution at a location,” said a BMC official. “For example, it could be vehicular pollution at a particular location or a dumping yard of BMC. There could be complaints about pollution at places where small-scale or cottage industries are situated or from our own plant or infrastructure site.”
The official added that once the vans are deployed, they would have a systematic plan or program for the deployment of the air quality monitoring vans. “The deployment will also help in detecting trends with regards to air pollution and carrying out surveys according to various time slots too,” the official said.
Hema Ramani, a member of Mumbai Clean Air Hub, which focuses on air pollution advocacy, expressed hope that the municipal corporation’s significant investment in mobile air quality monitoring vans would yield tangible benefits for the people of Mumbai and improve the city’s air quality as well as awareness related to air pollution. “Since this is taxpayers’ money, it is imperative for BMC to make all outputs from these mobile vans publicly available. These vans should be utilised to create a comprehensive hotspot mapping of air quality across all wards, enabling a better understanding of the issue citywide,” Ramani said. “Additionally, BMC should deploy these vans to monitor construction sites and ensure compliance with all established guidelines.”
In a related development, the municipal corporation has issued intimation notices to 656 project sites, including civic infrastructure sites across the city, asking them to adhere to air pollution mitigation guidelines, and to submit an environment management plan.
