Blame industrial pollution for worsened droughts in India: Study

Representational Image

A study recently conducted by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) has revealed that worsening droughts in the country could also be the result of air pollution and not just El Nino conditions.

It stated that, during the El Nino years, the chances of pollutants travelling from South Asia to aggravate the effects of the climate cycle on the monsoons increases. This, in turn, increases the likeliness of droughts manifold, reported the Times of India.

The study by IITM further pointed out that the country had witnessed 17 percent increase in the severity of droughts in the past years as a result of changes in aerosol pollution. In effect, increased amount of pollutants in the Asian Tropopause Aerosol Layer -- a high-altitude pollutant cover – adversely affected the amount of solar radiation in the monsoon regions. As a result, the drought situation often worsened further due to reduced monsoon circulation.

The occurrence of this phenomenon will increase further in the future if the industrial emissions coming in from the east and south Asia does not reduce any time soon. As highlighted, increased pollution would thicken the aerosol layer in the troposphere, which may worsen the intensity of droughts plaguing India.

Suvarna Fadnavis, an IITM scientist, concurred that uncontrolled industrial emissions from China and India added thousands of metric tonnes of aerosol to the atmosphere. She added, “In a global warming environment, the tropical Pacific zone is bound to see increased and more severe El Nino conditions and that the situation wouldn’t get any better until the 2040s.”

IITM researcher TP Sanin, who co-authored the study, stated that El Nino itself had decreased the incidence of rainfall on India, suppressed by anywhere between 2 mm and 6 mm daily, to be precise. “Add to this the effect of aerosols, and the decrease in rainfall is around 17% over central India,” as per the study.