LAHORE: The Punjab government has directed the meteorological department to start forecasting smog level in the province on the basis of data shared by the Environment Protection Agency, said sources.
This is for the first time in the history of the meteorological department that the task has been handed over to it by the provincial government. Earlier, the Agency was carrying it out since 1997, said sources, and added that a meeting had taken place a day earlier where the decision was finalized by the concerned provincial minister.
Ch Muhammad Aslam, Regional Director of the department, confirmed the development, saying that the department has started forecasting smog data and a link has been provided to the Agency. He said the department would be issuing the air quality forecast for the next 48 hours at 11:00 AM every day. This forecast will be based upon the data of last 24 hours provided by the Agency to the department, he added.
According to him, the forecast would consist of the information like parameter, minimum level, humidity level, wind direction, weather forecast and air quality forecast.
Ch Aslam was also part of a meeting held with Chief Minister Punjab Usman Buzdar in the chair on Friday. He said the Chief Minister has desired holding of a joint meeting of all the concerned departments on fortnightly basis.
He said the Agency is in a bad state of affairs so far as the monitoring of air quality in the city is concerned. They said it has installed air quality monitoring equipment at six locations in the city, out of which only one is in order while rest of the five are in disorder.
Only the monitoring equipment installed in the area of Township is in working condition while those installed at the meteorological department, Town Hall and Simla Hill are out of order. Only the one installed at the Town Hall is able to monitor the element of carbon mono oxide, he said. Similarly, the Agency has a mobile van for the same purpose which is not in order at all.
He said the relevant authority of the Agency had informed the Punjab government that a request has been forwarded to issue funds for the repairing of monitoring equipments. Meanwhile, the temperature of the city of Lahore has dropped to 9.3 degree Celsius which has increased the moisture level to over 90 percent, brining the air pressure further down to aggravate the phenomenon of smog further.
It may be noted that the temperature of the city was 16 degree Celsius on 1st of November and it has fallen by 7 degree Celsius since then to 9 degree Celsius on Friday. Meanwhile, the minimum temperature has dropped further to 4 to 5 degree Celsius, a situation that would lead to end of dengue larva in Punjab. There would no more production of larva throughout the Punjab, said Shahid Abbas, Director of the meteorological department.
Departmental sources said there is a chance of strong wind on 24th and 25th of November that may drift away smog for a while. However, it would re-emerge once the windy spell is over.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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