Project launched to improve air quality in Dhaka city

The government with support from the World Bank Monday launched a Tk 487 crore mega project to improve the air quality of the densely populated Dhaka city.
The five-year project, the Clean Air and Sustainable Environment, will be implemented by the Department of Environment, Dhaka City Corporation and Dhaka Transport Coordination Board.
This is the first project that integrates the environment and transport under one common objective to improve the air quality of capital Dhaka, a sprawling city of 12 million people.
‘The CASE project will improve the air quality in Dhaka city by addressing two main air-polluting sectors, the brick manufacturing and the transport sectors, Roads and Highways Division secretary Mozammel Haque Khan told a project-launching workshop.
The Ministry of Environment and Forest and the World Bank jointly organised the programme at Sonargaon Hotel in the city.
The transport policy adviser to Panning Commission, Dr Rahmatullah, the director general of Local Government Division, Swapan Kumar Sarkar, Professor Hoque of BUET, senior urban transport manager of World Bank Hubert Nove Jessrerand, CASE task team leader Maria Sarraf of WB, CASE project directors of environment component Dr Mohammad Nasiruddin and Traffic Management DCC component Eng Shehab Ullah, and DTCB traffic engineer Anisur Rahman, among others, attended the function.
Mozammel Haque said the project would introduce cleaner technologies in the highly polluting brick manufacturing sector, reduce energy consumption and lower air pollution.
‘In urban areas, the project will introduce low-cost measures to reduce conflict between motorised and non-motorised vehicles, reduce congestion and provide safer and cleaner mobility for pedestrian in pilot areas of the city,’ he said.
DTCB traffic engineer Anisur Rahman said the project would improve the traffic flow and pedestrian mobility and safety, build 25 foot over-bridges, 70 km of new sidewalks, 80km of one-way streets.
‘It’ll improve bus route network and introduce Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) on at least one corridor,’ he added.
About traffic component of the project, Eng Shehab Ullah said the project objectives are to improve traffic flow in project intervention locations by increasing 10 per cent of vehicular traffic and decreasing 10 per cent of accidents.
Dr Nasiruddin said if the exposure to urban air pollution could be reduced by 20 per cent to 80 per cent it would result in saving 1,200 to 3,500 lives annually and avoiding 80 to 230 million cases of disease.
Sarraf said the CASE project will include some 25 brick kilns using cleaner technology to reduce air pollution and strengthen the DCC and DTCB.
Nasiruddin said the project will help decrease emission by 20-30 per cent per brick kiln that will adopt a cleaner technology from a baseline of more than 1,000 mg/m3.
‘There will be reduction in greenhouse gas emission per brick kiln adopting cleaner technology by 15-20 per cent compared to a baseline of about 760 tonmes per year for the production of 2 million bricks,’ he added.
Acting Operations Advisor of the World Bank in Bangladesh Mohamed Toure said the Bank is particularly happy to be able to support the government to tackle Dhaka’s environmental, transport and traffic challenges through the innovatively designed CASE project focusing on reducing air pollution and safe mobility under a co-benefit approach.

Courtesy of UNB. Dhaka