Study on Indian Cities and Clean Transportation

What was the Study?

The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), New Delhi, released a study, which examines questions such as:

·      How are some cities, which hold sizeable shares of India’s urban population, positioned in the race for clean and low carbon mobility?

·      Which cities pollute and guzzle more than the others from only urban commute?

·      What is influencing the difference? 

The vehicle population is exploding in Indian cities. It took 60 years – from 1952 to 2008 – for the number of registered vehicles in the country to cross 100 million. But that figure had doubled by 2015. At the same time, the share of public transport in overall transportation modes is expected to decrease from 75.5% in 2000-01 to 44.7% in 2030-31. 

The study assessed 14 cities to understand how the urban commute – the way people travel in cities – contributed to air pollution and energy consumption. The study ranks the cities on the basis of emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and toxic pollutants like particulate matter and nitrogen oxides, as well as energy guzzling from urban commuting. 

What are the key findings?

• Bhopal tops for lowest overall emissions and energy use from urban commute
• Kolkata and Mumbai emit least among six megacities due to high usage of public transport and walking; Kolkata also has short travel distances due to its compact form.
• Delhi, despite being the third highest for high share of public transport trips, is at the bottom as overall emissions and fuel use are highest due to the sheer number of people, high volume of travel and personal vehicles, and long trip-distances.
• Megacities of Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Chennai show poor scores. They have lower share of public transport compared to Delhi and yet have scored better than Delhi only because of total travel volumes are comparatively lower given their population levels. With growth and without adequate action they could get worse in future.
• Though metropolitan cities have scored better than megacities due to lower population, lower travel volume and vehicle numbers, they are at risk due to much higher share of personal vehicle trips and high growth rate

·       Increase in greenhouse gas emissions from transport sector is highest among all the sectors in India. Urban traffic is also the source of very high health-damaging toxic emissions. 

What is the ranking of the 14 cities?

The rankings are given below, with the best one first.

  

Overall emissions and energy consumption:

1. Bhopal
2. Vijayawada
3. Chandigarh
4. Lucknow
5. Kochi
6. Jaipur
7. Kolkata
8. Ahmedabad
9. Pune
10. Mumbai
11. Hyderabad
12. Bengaluru
13. Chennai
14. Delhi 

Per-travel trip emissions and energy consumption

1. Kolkata
2. Mumbai
3. Bhopal
4. Delhi
5. Ahmedabad
6. Lucknow
7. Vijayawada
8. Pune
9. Jaipur
10. Chennai
11. Bengaluru
12. Kochi
13. Chandigarh
14. Hyderabad 

What should be done?

According to CSE, the study proves that for clean and low carbon mobility, cities need policies to:

·       stop urban sprawl

·       reduce distances between residence, jobs and recreation through compact urban forms

·       scale up integrated public transport, walking and cycling

·       put restraints on use of personal vehicles to avert pollution and climate crisis.