A Critical Review on Air Quality Studies in Different Regions of India

Abstract

Air quality in India is a field of bother. There has been a constant degradation in the quality of air from the past few years. According to the reports of WHO/UNEP (1992), some of the metropolitan cities in India are in the list of most polluted cities in the world. The poor air quality directly affects the ecosystem and has a major impact on the human health. The contamination of pollutants mainly SO 2, NO 2, RSPM, and PM 10 are responsible for poor air quality. Statistics show that 4-5 million people die each year around the globe due to poor air quality. The highest death recorded was 7 million in the year 2012. Poor air quality leads to breathing problems and directly affects the internal respiratory organs of the body. The ambient air standard is analyzed with the help of air quality index (AQI) which gives a relative measure for ambient air concentration. This review paper gives an idea about the air quality in some of the expeditious flourishing regions of India. The study also enlightens the effect of parameters such as SO 2, NO 2, RSPM, and PM 10 on to air pollution and the need for the measures against the poor air quality.