Recently, the Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and Chief Minister of Rajasthan presented the Swachh Vayu Survekshan Award 2024 on the occasion of International Swachh Vayu Neel Gagan Diwas (Clean Air Day) in Jaipur.
Note:
International Day of Clean Air Neel Gagan is observed on 7th September every year to raise awareness and take action to improve air quality. This was announced by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 2019.
Swachh Vayu Survekshan Awards 2024:
The Swachh Vayu Survekshan Awards, 2024, were presented to the best performing National Clean Air Campaign (NCAP) cities in three categories based on population.
The winning cities are:
Category-1 (population more than 10 lakh) Agra, Jabalpur and Surat.
Category-2 (population between 3-10 lakh) Firozabad, Amravati and Jhansi.
Category-3 (population less than 3 lakh) Raebareli, Nalgonda and Nalagarh.
The Municipal Commissioners of the winning cities were awarded with cash prizes, trophies and certificates.
Clean Air Surveys (SVS)
The Clean Air Survey (SVS) is a new initiative by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) to rank cities based on air quality and implementation of activities approved under the City Action Plan (NCAP) in 131 non-attainment cities.
Cities are declared non-attainment if they do not consistently meet the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for PM10 or NO2 over a period of 5 years.
The classification of cities has been done on the basis of Census-2011.
Criteria:
The cities were evaluated on eight key points:
Control of biomass Burning
Municipal solid waste
Road dust
Dust from construction and demolition
Waste Vehicular emissions
Industrial emissions
Public awareness
Improving PM10 concentrations
National Clean Air Campaign (NCAP):
The National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) aims to control air pollution systematically by involving all stakeholders and ensuring necessary action.
131 cities have been identified for implementation of city-specific action plans under NCAP.
Target:
This is the first attempt in the country to create a national framework for air quality management with a time bound reduction target.
It aims to achieve at least 20% reduction in the concentration of heavy (PM10 or less than 10 micrometres in diameter) and fine particles (PM 2.5 or less than 2.5 micrometres in diameter) in the coming five years with base year 2017.
Monitoring:
PRANA portal has also been launched by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
Monitoring the implementation of NCAP.
Monitoring the status of action plans and implementation of cities.
To make the best practices adopted by the cities exemplary for others.
