Key Delhi air monitor went dark in peak farm fire week

In the week when farm fires are usually at their worst, the key air-monitoring model for New Delhi — called the Decision Support System (DSS) — went offline for four days. When it came back, it revealed very low figures for stubble-burning contributions to PM2.5 — just around 4.06% on Monday and 1.74% on Tuesday — though in previous years the contribution was more like 35% plus on the same dates. Officials say the fires may have been delayed because of floods earlier in surrounding states, but the data gap and the fact that the model runs on an outdated emissions inventory raise doubts about how reliable it is. Transparency experts say this kind of monitoring failure weakens efforts to fight air pollution.

Read the full report here: Key Delhi air monitor went dark in peak farm fire week