Abstract:

The prevalence of the rapidly expanding industry, exponential growth in the number of vehicles, intensive use of substandard fuel is the common problem of the South Asian region which is responsible for making the air quality problem a major environment priority. Such pollutants can be transported regionally over scales from about 100 to a few 1000s of kilometers, large enough to cross state, provincial, national, and even continental boundaries. The significance of transboundary pollution is immense for Nepal as it is landlocked country between India and China. Managing these regional pollutants requires a database on the nature of the pollutant, the linkages between pollutants and of impacts at different geographic scales and more important the collaborative efforts and regional cooperation between multiple jurisdictions. Regional air quality management systems are an example of a promising approach to this issue. Malé Declaration on control and prevention of air pollution and its likely transboundary effect and Project Atmospheric Brown Cloud (ABC) are the two major initiatives taken to tackle transboundary air pollution in Nepal. The study outlines the present status of the ongoing study which measures radiation, aerosol, PM10 and rain water chemistry.

Full paper:

Initiative to study transboundary air pollution in Nepal [.doc, 1342.4Kb]