Pollution Control On The Move
It's a sweltering day in May, and there's a colourful Maruti van near the Ram Manohar Lohia hospital. Painted over with pink flowers and the names of all the sponsors, it's clear that the legend in bold letters FREE is the main attraction. A snaking line of two-wheelers, three-wheelers and owner-driven cars blocks the road. Everyone and his uncle, it seems, wants to have their vehicle checked for pollution.
The van, one of three that was donated by Maruti Udyog Ltd, is run by Welcomenviron, a wholly-owned subsidiary of ITC Welcomgroup, and co-sponsored by Tulika Public Service. In the horrendously polluted capital, this is perhaps the only such agency offering free of cost pollution checks on a regular basis: those that periodically come into force do so for an average of two or three days. Most service stations provide pollution checks at a cost of Rs 25. The van travels to all parts of Delhi including Gurgaon and Noida six days of the week. It is often invited by corporate houses in the city, such as Pepsi, to check pollution levels of employees' cars.
Ex-serviceman Yashwant Nayal who doubles up as the driver of the van as well as the issuer of certificates knows the pollution norms backwards. And well he might. It's a job he's been doing since he retired from the Army Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Corps (EME) three years ago. "For a two-stroke vehicle, which is what most two- and three-wheelers are, the maximum acceptable level of carbon monoxide is 4.5 per cent, and for a car it is three per cent." Nayal postulates that in the case of petrol vehicles, smoke from the carburettor is not automatically equal to pollution, carbon monoxide not being physically visible. Diesel vehicles are another ball game, however. Hydrocarbon, the pollutant emitted, is the unsightly black smoke that most ageing buses and lorries in the capital belch.
Nayal specialises in philosophy of the home-grown variety. "While carbon monoxide is harmful for the lungs, hydrocarbon spoils the atmosphere." It is his observation that things have changed for the better in the last three years that the van has been operational. "When we first started operations, we would stop at a pre-arranged spot and try to flag down vehicles without much success. Now, it's the vehicles that flag us down."
The van contains a microprocessor infrared exhaust gas analyser. It is this, when attached to an idling vehicle's silencer, that provides a printout of the carbon monoxide emission.
Polluting vehicles can normally be corrected by an on-the-spot adjustment of the petrol-air mixture. "Vehicles do not become polluting just because they are old," opines Nayal "but because they're driven for months without being serviced."
However, diesel vehicles, the real culprit, do not seem to have a concomitant service. Neither does there seem to be any move to ensure quality control at
petrol pumps.
The driver of a three-wheeler, Sohan Lal, in line to have his pollution checked, has much to say on the subject. "You can't penalise a small petrol driven vehicle and let off government run buses which spew black smoke into the air. Neither can you let go scot free those who adulterate fuel." Still, the pollution-control vans can provide a brief breath of fresh air.