New Delhi: On the occasion of the International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies, the Union Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav inaugurated the first "functional" Smog Tower, located at Anand Vihar, here in Delhi. Before this, Delhi Government had also inaugurated a smog tower at Connaught Place, on August 23, but it is yet to become functional at full capacity.
While addressing the event, Union Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav said, "Out of 132 cities that do not meet the clean air standards, 86 had shown improvement in air quality parameters in 2018, which increased to 104 cities in 2020."
He also expressed hope that the pilot project will yield fruitful results and supplement the air quality improvement efforts.
He later tweeted, "The focus of policies of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji's govt are intertwined with sustainable utilisation, protection and conservation of public goods and environment. Happy to share that on International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies inaugurated a Smog Tower in Delhi."
Also read:Delhi gets India's first smog tower
A smog tower is a structure designed as a large or medium scale air purifier to reduce air pollution usually by forcing the air through filters.
The Smog tower at Anand Vihar with a height of over 20 is of downdraft type. The polluted air comes in from the top of the tower and clean air comes out from the bottom, intended for localised reduction in air pollution. The filtration system used in the tower has been designed by the University of Minnesota with an expected efficiency of 90%.
45 fan units have been installed to provide a flow rate of 1000 cubic meters per second. The tower has been built by Tata Projects Limited with NBCC (India) Limited as the project management consultant.
In addition to this, the Union Minister also launched a portal, namely 'PRANA'- Portal for Regulation of Air-pollution in Non-Attainment cities under the National Clean Air Programme. NCAP is being implemented since 2019 with the target to achieve 20-30 percent reduction in Particulate Matter (PM) concentrations by 2024.
Also read:Delay in installing smog tower in Delhi irks SC
This will support tracking of physical as well as the financial status of city Action Plan implementation and disseminate information on air quality to the public.
During the event, Minister of State for Environment, Ashwini Choubey gave a new slogan, "Swachh Pawan, Neel Gagan", emphasizing that for Blue Skies we need to work towards making the air clean.
