Vehicles, high-rises are poisoning the Mumbai air

Mumbai: It’s time to apply the brakes. The city’s love for cars and high-rises is taking a heavy toll on the quality of its air.According to latest studies carried out by the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB), air pollution levels in the city are approaching the point of no return.

The MPCB had conducted two studies — one to plot the annual concentration of pollutants, and the other to track the month-wise pollution rate — to map the air pollution trend.

The first one revealed an alarming rise in the annual concentration of pollutants like sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), and respirable suspended particulate matter (RSPM) in the last four years. The rise was 36%, 13%, and 11%, respectively.

Further, the concentration of these pollutants in the air was way above the prescribed limits, the study found. The NOx levels, for instance, have reached a level (86 micrograms per cubic metre of air — µg/m3), which is more than twice the prescribed limit (40µg/m3). Annual concentration of RSPM levels (202µg/m3), too, was found to be twice the permissible limit, whereas SO2 levels were below the set limit of 50µg /m3. MPCB officials said that a 36% jump in four years in the pollutants’ level was disturbing.