08 September 2006

United States, India Cooperating To Cut Vehicular Air Pollution

Grant will help Indian partners reduce toxic emissions from trucks, buses

 

A policeman checks the pollution caused by the exhaust of a taxi in Calcutta, India. (©AP Images)

By Lea Terhune
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington – The United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) has awarded a $296,000 grant to the city of Pune, in India’s Maharashtra state, to implement innovative measures that reduce vehicular air pollution.

The grant will fund a project to retrofit diesel-fuelled buses with technologies designed to reduce toxic emissions and utilize low-sulfur diesel fuel, to test those technologies and to perform environmental impact assessments. It is part of a series of anti-pollution cooperative ventures between the United States and India.

The grant was confirmed at a signing ceremony at the U.S. Consulate in Mumbai on September 1.

India’s urban pollution levels are among the worst in the world. Vehicular emissions are responsible for much of that pollution. Since the early 1990s, several Indian cities have taken steps to improve their increasingly compromised air quality. New Delhi placed limits on emissions for gasoline and diesel-powered vehicles, prohibited the use of vehicles more than 15 years old and introduced buses and taxis powered by compressed natural gas (CNG).

The challenge is for environmental measures to keep pace with India’s population growth, urbanization and industrialization. The USTDA grant aims to tailor technologies to the locations in which they will be used and measure how successful they are in increasing the efficiency of vehicular pollution control.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) South Asia Program Director Ted MacDonald told the Washington File that several technologies will be used to retrofit diesel engines currently in use and low-sulfur fuels will be tested.

“The object is to get a better understanding of the options that exist and get data on them.  Various options are available,” he said, and that “adding to the base of information” is an important component of the project.

 

PMC Manager Shivraj Rane and USTDA Regional Director Carl Kress shake hands at a U.S. Consulate Mumbai ceremony. (©AP Images)

“A lot of decisions get made without a sense of efficacy or cost,” he said. The data gathered will help evolve more effective strategies. MacDonald cited CNG as an example. In the early days of CNG implementation it was thought that the diesel-to-CNG conversion kit was the answer, but the kits do not live up to expectations. Experience shows the need for dedicated CNG engines. Solid data obtained in Pune might aid in future decision-making elsewhere, he said.

The Pune project will focus on retrofitting buses with diesel particulate filters, diesel oxidation catalysts and other innovative retrofit technologies verified by the EPA or the California Air Resources Board to reduce air pollution. Technology transfer, development and data from the project might yield knowledge that both India and the United States can use.

Diesel exhaust is a prime source of potentially toxic microscopic particles (fine particulate matter).  Studies in the United States have shown that bus emissions present a serious health risk, particularly to children. Prolonged exposure to particulate matter can contribute to respiratory diseases including asthma, bronchitis, lung damage and has been linked to cancer. The EPA reports that children are most susceptible to these adverse effects because they breathe 50 percent more air per pound of body weight than do adults.

“We are looking at diesel engines being produced right now that still have emissions issues,” MacDonald said. “They are going to be on the road for 20 years. What are we going to do about them?”

The long-term goal of the collaboration with the Pune Municipal Corporation and the Nagpur-based National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) is to develop a viable system for Pune that might later be applied in other Indian cities.

Besides its Nagpur headquarters, NEERI has zonal bases in five major Indian cities. Its mission is to promote sustainable development through environmental science and engineering. On the U.S. side, the EPA and the U.S. Agency for International Development are working with NEERI and other local participants to improve urban air quality.

The USTDA grant supports an important U.S. outreach initiative, the Partnership for Clean Fuels and Vehicles, and the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate, in which the United States participates. (See fact sheet.)

Additional information on clean diesel technology is available on the EPA Web site.

For more information on U.S. policy, see Environment.

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)