Off the road: Vehicle pollution needs structured solutions, policy action

The proposed CAFE norms also show that addressing the problem needs a better approach

The rescinding of the fuel ban on “end of life vehicles” (ELVs) barely two days after it came into effect reflects the problems with a well-intentioned but impractical approach to the knotty problem of reducing toxic air-pollution norms in Delhi. The city was a test case. Under the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) directive, the ban was to be phased in throughout the National Capital Region (NCR) — from July 1 in Delhi, November 1 in “high-density” districts in the NCR, and from April 1, 2026, in the rest of the NCR. The rules covered diesel vehicles over 10 years old and petrol cars over 15 years old. To be sure, this CAQM directive has been upheld by courts for at least a decade. There was a 2014 order by the National Green Tribunal, and it was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2018. 

There is also logic to these rules: Emitted particulate matter (PM) from a car that is over 10 years old is 11 times more polluting than a car following Bharat Stage (BS) VI norms. Old heavy-duty trucks can emit 36 times more PM as against a BS VI-compliant truck. But as the initial effort to impose the ban has shown, inadequate monitoring equipment has made a mockery of the directive.  On the first day, 80 vehicles were seized and 98 notices issued. On the second day, just seven vehicles were seized and 78 notices issued. Apart from “critical operational and infrastructural challenges”, the Delhi government has cited “public discontent and outcry”. The latter partially had to do with the fact that the government had left unanswered the question of how diesel-vehicle owners who had paid the 15-year registration tax in Delhi would be reimbursed. Besides, there are over 6 million ELVs in Delhi. Of those, about 4 million are two-wheelers. The government is likely to be considering the political fallout from the measure. An illegal cross-border market for fuel within the NCR was another unintended outcome.

  The question, however, is whether the blunt instrument of a vehicle ban is an effective way of tackling pollution in the NCR. Though there is undoubtedly a link between ELVs and bad air, there are many other contributory factors such as construction dust, firecrackers, and the burning of paddy stubble. This apart, badly maintained vehicles can be found in any age cohort, pointing to the need for upgraded pollution-testing equipment. Adequate infrastructure for scrapping ELVs, with efficient recovery rates of critical materials, is also important. The NCR has just 13 such authorised centres. 

  The proposed Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFE) norms — the ones that require manufacturers to reduce fleet-wide average emission targets by one-third by April 1, 2027, but they would militate against small cars, which are more fuel-efficient — also show that addressing the problem needs a better approach.  In short, a more structured approach towards vehicular pollution, such as accelerating the adoption of electric vehicles and offering more rigorous testing standards, would work better than blanket age-related vehicle bans.