Delhi residents cough, wheeze as pollution soars A stay in India's capital often leads to a case of the notorious "Delhi belly," but as pollution rises, many visitors and residents are suffering from the Delhi itchy eye and hacking cough too. Authorities blame the rise in pollution squarely on a jump in diesel cars, whose fumes are routinely cited in medical studies as a major health risk. About a third of the nearly 1,000 new cars that hit the city's roads every day are diesel models, which are becoming popular because the fuel is cheaper than petrol. But while there is a financial saving, it comes at a serious pollution and health cost, warn experts, who say New Delhi is rapidly losing the air quality gains made after switching its diesel bus fleet to compressed natural gas six years ago. Pollution figures show a steady rise in diesel-linked pollution during the past five years, a period that saw the total number of cars in Delhi leap 50 percent to 1.6 million. Anumita Roychoudhury, from New Delhi's Centre for Science and Environment, noted carbon monoxide levels were falling despite an increase in the number of petrol cars. However, "for diesel cars, the increase in vehicle numbers and increase in nitrogen dioxide are strongly correlated," she said. She pointed to "horrendously" high levels of lung-irritating soot linked to tailpipe diesel emissions, which environmentalists regard as one of the most toxic forms of air pollution. Roychoudhury urged India to adopt ultra-clean car standards cutting diesel sulphur levels. "You need a technology leapfrog," she told AFP.
Cor luv a dook. There's gannin' to be serious upward pressure on the price of oil. Just can't see the price coming down with the kinda demand that seems to be out there.
