Abstract

The smaller cities in India are facing acute problems due to air pollution but remain unaccounted due to lack of effort in highlighting them through studies. Ambient pollution data and climate data of one tier 2 Indian city, Guwahati, were collected for three years, i.e., 2016–2018 and analyzed. It showed that the winter season was very harsh from the air pollution point of view as almost 99% of the time the ambient PM₁₀ concentrations were recorded to be more than 100 µg m ^− 3. Based on a derived and validated MLR equation, the PM_2.5 level for the non-monitored areas of the city was predicted. The non-carcinogenic health risk assessment of PM_2.5 was done with the help of hazard quotients (HQs) of the city and presented as a GIS-based map. During the winter, the city faced acute health risks because the computed HQ values were found to be more than ‘1’ in most of the areas of the city. Considering the high mortality burden associated with air pollution exposure in India, the policy-makers need to initiate focused policy prescriptions to curb air pollution concentrations for the smaller cities as well.

摘要

印度的小城市由于空气污染而面临着严峻的问题，但由于缺乏通过研究强调这些问题的努力，因此仍未得到解决。收集了印度三年级（2016-2018年）的二线印度古瓦哈提市的环境污染数据和气候数据，并进行了分析。结果表明，从空气污染的角度来看，冬季非常严酷，因为记录到的PM ₁₀浓度几乎有99％的时间超过100 µg m  ^-3。根据推导并验证的MLR方程，可以预测城市非监控区域的PM _2.5水平。PM _2.5的非致癌性健康风险评估借助城市的危险商（HQ）进行，并显示为基于GIS的地图。在冬季，该城市面临严重的健康风险，因为在该城市的大部分地区发现计算出的HQ值均大于“ 1”。考虑到印度与空气污染暴露相关的高死亡率负担，政策制定者需要启动针对性的政策规定，以减少较小城市的空气污染浓度。