New Delhi typically has some of the most polluted air in the world. Around this time last year, the Air Quality Index was about 160. As India began its lockdown, it had dropped as low as 45.
Across India, vehicular traffic has been cut to almost zero. Big industries billowing black smoke into the atmosphere are closed. Construction sites that are usually buzzing with activity, spewing dust and dry cement particles into the air, are eerily vacant.
All this has dramatically reduced the concentration in the air of fine particulate matter known as PM2.5 and PM10. Perhaps nowhere is the drop in pollutants more pronounced than in the country's capital New Delhi, which usually has some of theDelhi residents are used to looking up to see a hazy, gray sky. Now they're posting pictures of clear blue horizons on social media.
The air is typically so polluted that it leaves an acrid taste. During winter, smoke from crops burning across northern India wafts into the city and the pollution reading crosses 900 — above the safe limit prescribed by the World Health Organization. Flights are grounded periodically and schools are forced to close.
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