The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) has issued Guidelines for Promoting Community Boiler for Cluster of Small-Scale Industries. These guidelines were issued on March 6, 2024. Across the manufacturing landscape of India, steam boilers play a pivotal role in powering various industrial activities.

Based on the need to establish scientifically robust health-based standards, this working paper evaluates the global best practices for setting or revising air quality standards.

Air pollution in recent years has become one of the most critical environmental issues. According to the 2021 World Air Quality Report, almost every Indian city exceeded the recommended WHO air quality levels.

Since 2011, WHO has been compiling and publishing ground measurements of air quality and, specifically, the annual mean concentrations of particulate matter with a diameter ≤ 2.5 μm (PM2.5) and ≤ 10 μm (PM10).

Every winter, New Delhi’s Air Quality Index (AQI) becomes a central talking point amongst mainstream media, policymakers, and on social media. However, the issue of toxic air goes beyond the administrative boundaries of Delhi-NCR and affects millions of people – especially those residing in the Indo-Gangetic Plain (IGP).

On 14 February 2023, the European Parliament voted to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel CO2-emitting cars as of 2035, making headway in the EU’s “Fit for 55” package and the transition to climate neutrality by 2050.

Air pollution in Malaysia is caused by emissions from a growing number of sources from industrial manufacturing, power generation, vehicles, and open burning activities.

Air quality is a major challenge globally and is the single greatest environmental risk to human health. More than 90 per cent of the world’s population lives in areas that exceed the World Health Organization guideline for healthy air.

This report brings together the key insights from an air quality of analysis of 10 cities in South India: Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mysuru, Kochi, Mangalore, Visakhapatnam, Amaravati, Coimbatore and Puducherry. Observations show that PM2.5 and PM10 levels in all cities are well above the recommended World Health Organization limits.