NEW DELHI: Authorities in the smog-ridden Indian capital New Delhi on Sunday extended an emergency schools closure by a week, with no signs of improvement in the megacity’s choking levels of pollution.
Every autumn New Delhi is blanketed in acrid smog, primarily blamed on stubble-burning by farmers in the neighboring agrarian states.
The city is regularly ranked as one of the most polluted on the planet, with its annual smog blamed for hundreds of thousands of premature deaths each year.
“As pollution levels continue to remain high, primary schools in Delhi will stay closed till 10th November,” Delhi state’s education minister Atishi posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Secondary schools “are being given the option of shifting to online classes” added Atishi, who uses only one name, after days of high pollution levels.
The Indian capital — which has a population of 30 million — once again ranked as the world’s most polluted city Sunday, according to monitoring firm IQAir.
Delhi state annually imposes restrictions on construction activities and orders some vehicles off roads when pollution reaches severe levels.
But critics say that governments wilfully ignore the agricultural primary source of the public health crisis.
The farmers in neighboring states are a powerful electoral lobby and elected leaders have long resisted calls to impose strict fines and other punitive measures on them for their actions.
New Delhi is set to host a cricket World Cup match on Monday between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
But both teams canceled their scheduled pre-match training sessions in recent days over health risks from the smog.
Severe smog levels are expected to persist for several more weeks.
Levels of the most dangerous PM2.5 particles — so tiny they can enter the bloodstream — reached 570 micrograms per cubic meter on Sunday according to IQAir, nearly 40 times the daily maximum recommended by the World Health Organization.
A Lancet study in 2020 attributed 1.67 million deaths to air pollution in India during the previous year, including almost 17,500 in the capital.
And the average city resident could die nearly 12 years earlier than expected due to air pollution, according to an August report by the University of Chicago’s Energy Policy Institute.
India is heavily reliant on polluting coal for energy generation, resisting calls to phase it out, and its per capita coal emissions have risen 29 percent in the past seven years.
Smog-ridden Indian capital extends schools shutdown
https://arab.news/v76df
Smog-ridden Indian capital extends schools shutdown
- Every autumn New Delhi is blanketed in acrid smog, primarily blamed on stubble-burning by farmers
- Critics say that governments wilfully ignore the agricultural primary source of the public health crisis
First urban cable car unveiled outside Paris
- The cable car will carry some 11,000 passengers per day in its 105 gondolas
- The 138-million-euro project was cheaper to build than a subway, officials said
PARIS: Gondolas floated above a cityscape in the southeastern suburbs of Paris Saturday as the first urban cable car in the French capital’s region was unveiled.
Officials inaugurated the C1 line in the suburb of Limeil-Brevannes in the presence of Valerie Pecresse, the head of the Ile-de-France region, and the mayors of the towns served by the cable car.
The 4.5-kilometer route connects Creteil to Villeneuve-Saint-Georges and passes through Limeil-Brevannes and Valenton.
The cable car will carry some 11,000 passengers per day in its 105 gondolas, each able to accommodate ten seated passengers.
The total journey will take 18 minutes, including stops along the way, compared to around 40 minutes by bus or car, connecting the isolated neighborhoods to the Paris metro’s line 8.
The 138-million-euro project was cheaper to build than a subway, officials said.
“An underground metro would never have seen the light of day because the budget of more than billion euros could never have been financed,” said Gregoire de Lasteyrie, vice president of the Ile-de-France regional council in charge of transport.
It is France’s seventh urban cable car, with aerial tramways already operating in cities including Brest, Saint-Denis de La Reunion and Toulouse.
Historically used to cross rugged mountain terrain, such systems are increasingly being used to link up isolated neighborhoods.
France’s first urban cable car was built in Grenoble, nestled at the foot of the Alps, in 1934. The iconic “bubbles” have become one of the symbols of the southeastern city.
