Study to identify high-emission vehicle groups underway in Delhi

New Delhi, Jan 31 (PTI) The Delhi Transport Department has partnered with an international non-profit working on clean transportation to conduct a study to identify high-emission vehicle groups through remote sensing technology.

The study, which is underway, is being led by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) and supported by the Clean Air Fund (CAF). It is being done in collaboration with Delhi Transport Department, National Highways Authority of India and Gurugram administration.

The ICCT has previously led previously conducted similar studies in several European cities, including London, Paris and Brussels, and in Jakarta.

"The idea was to understand what the real-world emission coming from motor vehicles is. One way is that you look at ... the vehicle type and the other is you get an idea about it through the PUCC (pollution under control certificate). That is a very standard procedure, but we do not know the real-world performance.

"We started this data collection activity a couple of weeks back," said Amit Bhatt, ICCT managing director (India).

The remote sensing technology will be used to measure vehicle exhaust emissions at more than 15 locations across Delhi and Gurugram.

Bhatt said vehicle emissions from nearly one lakh vehicles will be studied and the study will continue till March.

"Remote sensing devices are installed at two ends of a road. When the vehicle passes, the spectrometre captures what comes out of the tailpipe. We capture the number plate, whether it is a DL number plate, a commercial one, make of the vehicle and the age of the vehicle," he said.

These are sophisticated devices and are costly. On a given day, one location is captured, Bhatt said.

"The device captures data when there isn't bunching of vehicles, like two tailpipes should not come together. There should be some kind of segregation," he said.

Till now, data from the toll plaza near Sonipat, DND toll plaza and Gurugram commercial toll plaza has been captured.

"We will also capture data from Delhi roads where there is not too much congestion or we can divert vehicles in a lane," Bhatt said.

He said these devices do not function at night and have to be manned for security reasons.

Bhatt said the study could pave the way for analysing whether pollution testing should really be looked at in India.

The study will also help identify high-emission vehicle groups or individual vehicles, assess the impact of vehicle age on fleet-wide emissions, evaluate the effect of driving conditions on emissions, compare the impact of ambient conditions on emissions, compare real-world emissions to regulatory limits and track long-term trends in real-world emissions.

Following the study, a training session for government stakeholders will be conducted to support the wider adoption of remote sensing programmes in various cities.

The results of the study are likely to be published in the first quarter of 2024, Bhatt said. PTI SLB DIV DIV