Assessment of meteorological parameters on air pollution variability over Delhi

In this study, the relationships between meteorological parameters (relative humidity, wind speed, temperature, planetary boundary layer, and rainfall) and air pollutants (particulate matter and gaseous pollutants) have been evaluated during a 3-year period from 2019 to 2021. Diffusion and dispersion of air contaminants were significantly influenced by meteorology over the capital city. The results of correlation matrix and principal component analysis (PCA) suggest a season’s specific influence of meteorological parameters on atmospheric pollutants’ concentration. Temperature has the strongest negative impact on pollutants’ concentration, and all the other studied meteorological parameters negatively (reduced) as well as positively (increased) impacted the air pollutants’ concentration. A two-way process was involved during the interaction of pollutants with relative humidity and wind speed. Due to enhanced moisture-holding capacity during non-monsoon summers, particles get larger and settle down on the ground via dry deposition processes. Winter’s decreased moisture-holding capacity causes water vapour coupled with air contaminants to remain suspended and further deteriorate the quality of the air. High wind speed helps in the dispersion and dilution but a high wind speed associated with dust particles may increase the pollutants’ level downwind side. The PM2.5/PM10 variation revealed that the accumulation effect of relative humidity on PM2.5 was more intense than PM10. Daily average location-specific rainfall data revealed that moderate to high rainfall has a potential wet scavenging impact on both particulate matters and gaseous pollutants.