The Centre of Excellence for Research on Clean Air (CERCA), IIT-Delhi, hosted a round-table conference on air quality at the institute on the need of data gathering, raising awareness and role of democracy and law to resolve the issues related to air quality.
The conference came up with suggestions on setting goals and pathways for achieving satisfactory ambient air quality in Delhi/NCR and other cities in India.
IIT Director V. Ramgopal Rao said many researchers at IIT-Delhi were working on the subject of air quality and CERCA provides them a platform to connect with the government for the implementation of research output for developing and refining government’s air pollution abatement plans and policy decisions.
He said, “CERCA is providing opportunities to researchers and people are coming together to address the issue of air pollution. Positive changes can be seen at this stage. CERCA is slowly but steadily making progress in addressing the air quality issue in Delhi.”
Sumit Sharma from TERI made a presentation on air quality outlook which indicated that with additional measures taken by the government, it might be possible to achieve the annual average of PM2.5 of 36 g/m3 from current level of 110 g/m3.
CERCA’s missions include ones to identify initiatives and policies in India and internationally which have been effective for sustained ambient air quality improvement. It hopes to provide scientific information and objective feedback on effectiveness of various clean air programmes to government’s policymakers.
