Depreciation in Ambient Air Quality in Iron Ore Mining Region of Goa

Abstract

Goa is one of the most famous international tourist destinations of the world. Export of Iron ore extracted from the midland of Goa is a major economic activity. However, there is a serious concern of air pollution due to iron ore mining activities. In order to assess the impact of mining activities on the environmental regime, the air quality depreciation index was adopted for this study due to its realistic and meaningful presentation of deterioration in ambient air quality. The index had been applied to the ambient air quality monitoring results of thirty four locations in the iron ore mining region of Goa. To envisage upon the deterioration in air quality due to various activities, eight stations were selected around mines, twelve in the buffer zone (within 4 Km radius of the core mining activities) and fourteen along the ore transportation routes for monitoring of SPM, PM10, SO2 and NOX. The deterioration of air quality in the iron ore mining region of Goa is clearly apparent as the depreciation in air quality was found < -1 from the most desired value of 0 at all the stations. In general, the air quality was found most depreciated along the ore transportation routes, which is also evidenced by a considerable load of particulate matters observed. This infers that ore transportation is the most devastating activity in the iron ore mining region of Goa and accordingly mitigation plan should be adopted.