Urban Computing For Air Quality Management In Indian Smart Cities With Reference To Pune City

Abstract

Even though, the ever increasing urbanisation across the globe has brought in newlineeconomic prosperity, it has also resulted in environmental and health hazards. newlineAir pollution is one of the most serious consequences of the rapid newlineurbanisation. The cities from developing countries, in particular, are found to newlinebe more vulnerable in this respect. This criticality has caught attention of newlinegovernments, researchers, policy makers, health professionals, and others. newlineThe United Nation s Sustainable Development Goals and the latest WHO newlineGlobal Air Quality guidelines are recommending clean air measures across newlineworld cities. In India, governmental programs such as the National Clean Air newlineProgram (NCAP) and the Smart City mission, are steps toward such newlinemeasures. Data and knowledge driven information are considered to be of newlinevital importance for successful implementation of these programs. newlineAddressing the sustainability related issues, smart cities are being newlinepromulgated globally on the premise that Information and Communication newlineTechnology (ICT) and data improves urban services. However, in many Indian newlinecities, the smart city programs and Urban Air Quality Management (UAQM) newlineservices are not aligned with each other, thereby constraining the cumulative newlineadvantage in building urban resilience. It is observed that the implementation newlineof urban environmental services in India is largely hindered by limited newlineavailability of data and siloed stakeholder operations. To add to it, the newlineabsence of a standardized mechanism for collaborative UAQM actions is newlineslowing the progress toward the clean air goals. newlineUAQM encompasses multi-sectorial functions involving real-time information newlineexchanges on emission sources, pollution levels, mitigation, health exposure, newlinesocio-economic impacts, and policy formulations. Currently, such sub-local newlineinformation is sparse in Indian cities constraining the progress toward clean newlineair goals.