For years, air pollution in Islamabad was caused mainly by pollen particles from its plentiful mulberry trees and by emissions from the Industrial Area and the brick kilns along the Islamabad Highway.

Recently, the air pollution situation in the capital has been aggravated by land clearing activities and digging for road construction and other development projects, as well as by gas emissions from increased motor traffic which also form particles in the atmosphere.

Vehicles travelling on under-construction roads and unpaved diversionary routes also create fugitive dust particles which pollute the air. Moreover, uncovered piles of earth and other materials at the construction sites also contribute to air pollution. One such uncovered storage pile of earth in H-sector is over 10 feet high. On some windy days, which is quite a common phenomenon in Islamabad, this construction area is enveloped in thick fog-like dust.

All this dust or particulate matter, known as PM-10 and comprising a broad class of chemically and physically diverse substances that exist as particles with a diameter less than or equal to 10 microns, is hazardous to health.

One of the worst polluted areas in the capital city is the under-construction stretch of Murree Road. The air pollution here is so bad on some days that the security guards at the entrances of the Islamabad Club and other hotels/motels along this road have started donning air-filtering white masks covering their noses and mouths.

According to the Pakistan Economic Survey last June, air pollution levels in Pakistan’s most populated cities are among the highest in the world — dust and smoke particles are generally twice the world average and five times higher than the developed world — causing serious health issues in the process.

Dust particles can cause negative health effects when inhaled by people working and living in the areas surrounding the construction sites and by motorists and commuters travelling through these areas. These health effects include premature death, acute respiratory illness, aggravated asthma, chronic bronchitis and decreased lung function. Some individuals, such as the elderly, young children, with pre-existing health problems and asthmatics are much more likely to suffer the negative health effects of PM-10.

With more road construction, a new industrial estate in I- Sector and other land development activities in the pipeline, the quality of air in the city is expected to deteriorate further in future, if we do not adopt measures in time to arrest the situation.

Over five years ago, the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency together with provincial environmental protection agencies started the process of establishing an air quality monitoring system in five cities (Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta) in collaboration with the Japan International Cooperation Agency. The project envisaged the installation of fixed and mobile air monitoring stations in these five cities to collect data about the ambient air quality. But until now this air monitoring system has not been fully instituted.

Many countries have long developed an air quality indexes, similar to the pollen count index which has already been adopted in Islamabad to help control the negative effects of air pollution. These indexes normally measure the concentration levels in the air of five major airborne pollutants found usually in urban areas, viz., carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, ozone and dust particles (PM-10). Different indexes use different air quality structures and health classifications.

For example, under the Air Quality Index of the US, the classification ranges from 0-50 (good air quality) to over 300 (hazardous air quality); while under the Air Pollution Index of Hong Kong, the classification ranges from 0-25 (low pollution level) to 201-500 (very high pollution level). Canada’s Air Quality Index ranges from 0-25 (good air quality) to over 100 (very poor air quality).

Islamabad is still waiting for Pepa’s air management project to materialise so that it can be brought under a similar air monitoring network whereby the state of air pollution — whether good, moderate, unhealthy for sensitive groups or worse — can be regularly communicated through the electronic and print media along with health advisory to the people to create more awareness. Just like the pollen index, this air pollution index can become a useful information tool for public health and environmental officials to advise the public about the general health effects associated with different pollution levels and to describe whatever precautionary steps may need to be taken if air pollution levels rise into the unhealthy range.

In addition to an air quality index, many cities elsewhere have also developed comprehensive plans for dust control targeted mainly at construction companies and industrial firms. Under these plans, construction companies and industrial firms whose activity result in dust emission are duty bound to adopt one or several methods of controlling dust emission from their land clearing activities, earth moving activities, storage piles of earth and other construction material.

These dust control methods include watering of the construction areas and materials by means of trucks and hoses, particularly before, during and after loading operations, or the application of non-toxic and environment-friendly chemical stabilisers which help to control dust particles by keeping the ground, stockpiles, roadways, construction and building sites wet for longer periods than water.

Other dust control methods include covering of storage piles by tarps or plastic material which should be properly anchored to prevent winds from removing them; wind fencing of construction sites, specially those adjacent to roadways or built-up areas; installation of barriers equal to the height of storage piles; and water flushing of streets and surrounding areas where construction material has spilled over.

A comprehensive air quality management plan for Islamabad will also require improvement in the industrial processes (e.g., changing the technology used in brick kilns and other smoke- emitting factories). Several efforts were made in the past decades to control the emissions from the Islamabad industrial area but these have made little progress because the area, which is adjacent to residential sectors, is still enveloped in a greyish-black haze, particularly in the mornings.

The most recent effort to control air pollution in the industrial area was made in December 2006 when the Supreme Court ordered Pepa to conduct a survey of the pollution abatement/control measures being adopted by industrial and commercial units in the Industrial Area and initiate legal proceedings against the violators as prescribed under the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997.

Finally, more roads and more driving lanes may help alleviate the traffic problems in the capital city but this only promotes more air pollution problems. Therefore, an effective air management plan will also necessitate the introduction of an environment-friendly public transport system to reduce the number of cars on the road, and thus reduce air pollution from direct car emissions and fugitive dust emission from cars travelling on unpaved and paved roads.