Plumes of smoke being emitted through the exhaust, and yet the motorist produces a “valid” emission certificate.
Faced with situations such as this, besides lack of monitoring of air pollution from vehicles, the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) has launched mobile monitoring to crack down on smoke-spewing vehicles.
On Wednesday, the State government launched 12 vehicles fitted with equipment to monitor three categories of vehicular pollutants: smoke density from diesel vehicles; and carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons in petrol vehicles. Of the 12, eight will be posted to check the growing vehicular population in Bengaluru, while one each will be deployed in Mysuru, Mangaluru, Dharwad and Kalaburagi.
Vehicular emissions cause more than 42 per cent of Respirable Suspended Particulate Matter pollution in the city, and more than two-thirds of the nitrous dioxide emissions. Currently, emission testing is done primarily by the transport department based only on Pollution Under Control certificate (and often, motorists are allowed to go if the certificate is not produced).
Between March 2013 and April 2016, the transport department checked over 31.38 lakh vehicles and booked just 90,000 vehicles - or, barely 3 per cent considered as polluters.
“Having sophisticated machines will help us do on-the-spot vehicle checks as well as check the validity of the emission centres. Even if someone produces PUC certificate, we can check if the values shown are correct,” said J. Gnanendra Kumar , Joint Commissioner (Transport) Bengaluru Urban, who said inspectors had the power to cancel the fitness certificates of “habitual offenders”.
Of particular worry are 15-year-old vehicles and diesel vehicles, he said.
Chairman of KSPCB Lakshman said personnel and technicians of the board will man the vehicles during the checks and routines. “We will start the inspection on Friday itself. Through regular checking and fines, awareness will be spread about maintenance of vehicles to keep pollutions low or discarding old vehicles,” he said. KSPCB hopes to supplement the strength of mobile monitoring vehicles to be deployed for vehicular emission checks.
