Agricultural Burning and Air Quality over Northern India: A Synergistic Analysis using NASA’s A-train Satellite Data and Ground Measurements
[2];
- Universities Space Research Association (USRA/GESTAR), Columbia, MD (United States); NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States)
- Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States)
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States); Morgan State Univ., Baltimore, MD (United States)
In recent years, New Delhi, the capital city of India, has been ranked among the most polluted cities in the world in terms of air quality related to Particulate Matter (PM). In this paper, we show that the PM2.5, a major component of the measure of air quality, over New Delhi is strongly impacted by the agricultural fires in the north-western Indian states of Punjab and Haryana during the post-monsoon season (October and November). Using data from NASA’s A-train sensors (MODIS, OMI, and CALIOP) in conjunction with the ground-level PM2.5 mass concentration measured at the US Embassy site in New Delhi (2013-2015), and back-trajectory analysis, it is shown that the smoke particles produced from numerous fires in Punjab and Haryana are advected over the national capital region under the influence of north-westerly winds, thereby greatly increasing the ground-level PM2.5 from 50 µg/m-3 before the onset of burning in early October to as high as 300 µg/m-3 (24-hour averaged, 7-day running mean) during the peak burning period in early November. Relationships between the satellite measurements of fire counts and aerosols in the crop burning region and PM2.5 over New Delhi are found to be strongly correlated. A linear regression analysis reveals that increments in the fire counts, aerosol optical depth, UV Aerosol Index, and aerosol absorption optical depth by 100, 1.0, 1.0, and 0.1 over the burning areas result in an increase in PM2.5 by 20, 47, 134, and 142 µg/m-3, respectively, over New Delhi. Back-trajectory analysis shows that about 74%, 62%, and 51% of total number of daily trajectories for altitudes 10 m, 500 m, and 1500 m, respectively, intercepted the biomass burning region before arriving at the receptor location in New Delhi; this further corroborates the transport mechanism observed in the satellite data. A 15-year long record of A-train satellite measurements shows an increasing number of agricultural fires (29% higher) and aerosol loading during the second half of the record (2009-2015) compared to that during the first half (2002-2008), which is one of the major concerns for the deteriorating air quality in the region.
- Research Organization:
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC05-76RL01830
- OSTI ID:
- 1700511
- Report Number(s):
- PNNL-SA-125481
- Journal Information:
- Aerosol and Air Quality Research, Vol. 18, Issue 7; ISSN 1680-8584
- Publisher:
- Chinese Association for Aerosol Research in TaiwanCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Source Contributions to Fine Particulate Matter and Attributable Mortality in India and the Surrounding Region
Constructing a spatiotemporally coherent long-term PM2.5 concentration dataset over China during 1980–2019 using a machine learning approach